If I had to place a bet now this second, I'd say LEAVE is going to win this, because: immigration.
But I don't and I won't, so I will stick with my predix of REMAIN by 56/44
But, still, wow... Conniptions in SW1
Immigration was always going to win it for Leave. The next few internet polls promise to be horrific for Remain. The whole narrative is now turning. Dave has lost control.
Good. I've been watching how ministers appearing in the media has been controlled. None of this is good for democracy.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
If leave win, expect a compliant Conservative party. The leavers will be delighted. The remainers will know they threw everything at the electorate and lost.
Nope.
Many of the Cons Remainers are at their wits end. There may well be a more dramatic consequence.
So if there is a leave vote in the referendum, the remainers will try to do what? Agitate for a re entry?
Which of course they would be perfectly entitled to do. No, but if you look at Lab and Cons they both have extreme wings (one man's extreme....yes I accept) and a centrist tendency.
As we have discussed on here at length, the problem for Lab is that many, apart from Jezza, have been accused of being Tory-lite. Meanwhile, in the Cons, it seems that Tory-liters have been faced by Tory-heavies. What more sensible route forward than for the two Tory-lite factions to come together?
Remain lead down to 5 points from 13 point last week with ORB phone poll
An 8 point move to leave in a week?
These polls are not that believable.
Choose your prejudice then pick the poll you like.
For a two horse race, the pollsters don't appear to have a clue...
Quite. An 8 point move in a week would be seismic. If other phone polls (or possibly polls in general) show the same I would be shocked. So will Cameron.
They can't really do a last minute believable vow either.
Apparently ORB changed the question they ask to the one that will actually be on the ballot.
Yes I agree with the thread header. Remain may well win but it's scorched earth stuff. No hearts and minds so nothing will be resolved unless in a parallel universe Juncker comes out on June 24th and says (after a narrow Remain) "ok I hear you UK - thus far and no further, no EU army, unified taxes, social policies etc etc for the UK ". He won't of course because he has a tin ear when it comes to the UK. He hasn't got a clue what makes us tick.
It's not that he has a tin ear, surely? It's just that he believes in what the EU is doing and where it's going, and believes in it so strongly that nothing else matters.
Fair point. It just that translates into a tin ear towards us. I doubt all but a tiny handful of Remainers are four square behind Juncker's vision.
And IMHO that is why the referendum debate has been such a lost opportunity. There has been no real attempt to inspire us with that vision - barely even any mention of Mr Cameron's re-negotiated package.
An honest debate would have genuinely settled the issue.
As it is, I am hopeful that a Leave outcome, although full of uncertainty as many point out, would result in a re-engagement with politics in this country.
I find the prospect quite exciting.
Indeed it has been a shocking loss of opportunity. Cameron pretended to negotiate and the Continentals pretended to negotiate back, both thinking there was not a cat in hell's chance of us voting Leave. Had either actually believed we, the British electorate, would be vaguely anywhere near close to fingering the trigger at this stage we might've had a more serious renegotiation than the charade we got that is now not mentioned precisely because it's just embarrassing all round.
I hope we vote leave and we then have the negotiations we should've had exempting us from swathes of the EU ( CAP for bloody starters) except this time the leaders would know we mean if and default is now " out " not " in ". It'll concentrate minds.
Remain lead down to 5 points from 13 point last week with ORB phone poll
An 8 point move to leave in a week?
These polls are not that believable.
Choose your prejudice then pick the poll you like.
For a two horse race, the pollsters don't appear to have a clue...
Quite. An 8 point move in a week would be seismic. If other phone polls (or possibly polls in general) show the same I would be shocked. So will Cameron.
They can't really do a last minute believable vow either.
I am simultaneously terrified, mesmerised and rhapsodised by this campaign
I expected LEAVE to be chaotic. I never expected REMAIN to be so utterly shit.
What strikes me is the nonchalance many lefties show towards a possible BREXIT.
Just on pb, we have Jonathan expressing ambivalence. And Mike Smithson apparently contemplating an OUT vote to screw the Tories. Even NPXMP doesn't seem particularly horrified by the idea of LEAVE.
I expected all three to be utterly fervent REMAINIACS.
Then Sandy Rentool, and so on.
If this is repeated across the country....
People on the left generally don't feel that strongly about it. The visceral emotion is almost all on the right. This clearly helps Leave.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
If leave win, expect a compliant Conservative party. The leavers will be delighted. The remainers will know they threw everything at the electorate and lost.
Nope.
Many of the Cons Remainers are at their wits end. There may well be a more dramatic consequence.
So if there is a leave vote in the referendum, the remainers will try to do what? Agitate for a re entry?
Which of course they would be perfectly entitled to do. No, but if you look at Lab and Cons they both have extreme wings (one man's extreme....yes I accept) and a centrist tendency.
As we have discussed on here at length, the problem for Lab is that many, apart from Jezza, have been accused of being Tory-lite. Meanwhile, in the Cons, it seems that Tory-liters have been faced by Tory-heavies. What more sensible route forward than for the two Tory-lite factions to come together?
To what end? They can't re enter the EU can they? It would be politically unacceptable.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
If leave win, expect a compliant Conservative party. The leavers will be delighted. The remainers will know they threw everything at the electorate and lost.
Nope.
Many of the Cons Remainers are at their wits end. There may well be a more dramatic consequence.
The Remain side is Cameron, Osborne and some of the payroll vote. If the PM had come out for Leave he would have carried 80-90% of MPs. There is no enthusiasm for Remain within the party outside of the federalists who are few in number and talk in hushed tones because they know their brand of EUfanaticism is complete poison.
If the people vote for Leave the party will fall in line in short order, if the Tories try and ignore the will of the people then I expect the government will fall, Dave and George will be cast aside and Gove will take over in the interim and fight the election vs Corbyn.
Remain lead down to 5 points from 13 point last week with ORB phone poll
An 8 point move to leave in a week?
These polls are not that believable.
Choose your prejudice then pick the poll you like.
For a two horse race, the pollsters don't appear to have a clue...
Quite. An 8 point move in a week would be seismic. If other phone polls (or possibly polls in general) show the same I would be shocked. So will Cameron.
They can't really do a last minute believable vow either.
Apparently ORB changed the question they ask to the one that will actually be on the ballot.
Really? What were they asking before? Why didn't they change it earlier?
What strikes me is the nonchalance many lefties show towards a possible BREXIT.
Just on pb, we have Jonathan expressing ambivalence. And Mike Smithson apparently contemplating an OUT vote to screw the Tories. Even NPXMP doesn't seem particularly horrified by the idea of LEAVE.
I expected all three to be utterly fervent REMAINIACS.
Then Sandy Rentool, and so on.
If this is repeated across the country....
Because one failing of Leave is to have allowed the debate to be framed in terms of infighting within the Conservative Party.
We might have a further development which would again focus attention on the Conservatives.
All of this marginalises the left.
Whose fault this is, who knows? Either an abnegation of its responsibilities by the left, or a solipsistic obsession by the right.
What strikes me is the nonchalance many lefties show towards a possible BREXIT.
Just on pb, we have Jonathan expressing ambivalence. And Mike Smithson apparently contemplating an OUT vote to screw the Tories. Even NPXMP doesn't seem particularly horrified by the idea of LEAVE.
I expected all three to be utterly fervent REMAINIACS.
Then Sandy Rentool, and so on.
If this is repeated across the country....
People on the left generally don't feel that strongly about it. The visceral emotion is almost all on the right. This clearly helps Leave.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
If leave win, expect a compliant Conservative party. The leavers will be delighted. The remainers will know they threw everything at the electorate and lost.
Nope.
Many of the Cons Remainers are at their wits end. There may well be a more dramatic consequence.
So if there is a leave vote in the referendum, the remainers will try to do what? Agitate for a re entry?
Which of course they would be perfectly entitled to do. No, but if you look at Lab and Cons they both have extreme wings (one man's extreme....yes I accept) and a centrist tendency.
As we have discussed on here at length, the problem for Lab is that many, apart from Jezza, have been accused of being Tory-lite. Meanwhile, in the Cons, it seems that Tory-liters have been faced by Tory-heavies. What more sensible route forward than for the two Tory-lite factions to come together?
Are you so wedded to the EU that you would call for a "unity" government to defy the will of the people? Have you been raiding the drinks cabinet tonight or something?
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
If leave win, expect a compliant Conservative party. The leavers will be delighted. The remainers will know they threw everything at the electorate and lost.
Nope.
Many of the Cons Remainers are at their wits end. There may well be a more dramatic consequence.
The Remain side is Cameron, Osborne and some of the payroll vote. If the PM had come out for Leave he would have carried 80-90% of MPs. There is no enthusiasm for Remain within the party outside of the federalists who are few in number and talk in hushed tones because they know their brand of EUfanaticism is complete poison.
If the people vote for Leave the party will fall in line in short order, if the Tories try and ignore the will of the people then I expect the government will fall, Dave and George will be cast aside and Gove will take over in the interim and fight the election vs Corbyn.
The will of the people will be for Leave, but what kind of Leave? It only takes a few Tories to wipe out the majority.
Remain lead down to 5 points from 13 point last week with ORB phone poll
An 8 point move to leave in a week?
These polls are not that believable.
Choose your prejudice then pick the poll you like.
For a two horse race, the pollsters don't appear to have a clue...
Quite. An 8 point move in a week would be seismic. If other phone polls (or possibly polls in general) show the same I would be shocked. So will Cameron.
They can't really do a last minute believable vow either.
Apparently ORB changed the question they ask to the one that will actually be on the ballot.
Really? What were they asking before? Why didn't they change it earlier?
Odd.
FFS, "hey guys, should we ask the actual question?"
If I had to place a bet now this second, I'd say LEAVE is going to win this, because: immigration.
But I don't and I won't, so I will stick with my predix of REMAIN by 56/44
But, still, wow... Conniptions in SW1
I'd be ramming immigration down the throats of the Remainians between now and election day and doing it relentlessly. Making them gag on it remorselessly; until they choke on the cold hard facts.
There's nothing racist or illiberal or distasteful about mentioning the failure of successive governments to understand immigration. Raising the issue of uncontrolled, unlimited immigration onto a small, highly-indebted island country is sensible. Pure commonsense - and something I reckon a huge majority of voters want raised.
It's commonsense pragmatism and genuine concern versus crass fucking stupidity. Stupidity led by metropolitan luvvies and multiculturalism-is-fab (as long as you ignore divided cities like Blackburn) types who resent Britain. Usually rich and detached enough to not understand working class concerns. Usually on the left. Usually wrong.
Rubbish. RemaIN allows us to unite with other people. Surely a noble thing - not being an isolationist and anti-foreigner.
The EU makes us isolationist. It makes us have an immigration policy that says a European with no education and no skills is more welcome in our country than an Indian, Chinese or African with higher education and a valuable skill set.
The EU is the epitome of isolationist protectionism.
The bit that people making this argument always omit is that our relationship with the EU is mutual. Yes, any of them can come here but, by the same token, any of us can go there. It's freedom of movement, not just immigration. And it's a far stretch of the imagination to describe this as isolationist!
Of course it is isolationist. We exclude 93% of the world's population not on the basis of whether or not they have anything to offer our country but just because they don't come from a particular political grouping. It is ridiculous, just like everything else about the EU.
Why do you insist on ignoring the fact that freedom of movement also gives all of us the right to live and work in any EU country? It's not all about immigration. How exactly is taking away that right supposed to make the UK less isolationist?
Each country should be able to determine its immigration policy based on what serves its own needs best. I certainly don't consider Australia isolationist, nor Canada. Both have immigration policies based on what is in the best interest of their economies and their ability to absorb new population. They have high rates of migration because that is what they need but they get the chance to pick the people they want. I fail to see what is so bad about that policy? It is certainly better than the current policy we have of white Europeans good, non whites from the rest of the world bad.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
If leave win, expect a compliant Conservative party. The leavers will be delighted. The remainers will know they threw everything at the electorate and lost.
Nope.
Many of the Cons Remainers are at their wits end. There may well be a more dramatic consequence.
So if there is a leave vote in the referendum, the remainers will try to do what? Agitate for a re entry?
Which of course they would be perfectly entitled to do. No, but if you look at Lab and Cons they both have extreme wings (one man's extreme....yes I accept) and a centrist tendency.
As we have discussed on here at length, the problem for Lab is that many, apart from Jezza, have been accused of being Tory-lite. Meanwhile, in the Cons, it seems that Tory-liters have been faced by Tory-heavies. What more sensible route forward than for the two Tory-lite factions to come together?
Are you so wedded to the EU that you would call for a "unity" government to defy the will of the people? Have you been raiding the drinks cabinet tonight or something?
Not at all. I am anti-wedded to extremists on both sides. If MPs decide to eschew extremism, present themselves to the public as non Marxist, non super right wingers and allow the public to make a decision, well so be it.
Remain lead down to 5 points from 13 point last week with ORB phone poll
An 8 point move to leave in a week?
These polls are not that believable.
Choose your prejudice then pick the poll you like.
For a two horse race, the pollsters don't appear to have a clue...
Quite. An 8 point move in a week would be seismic. If other phone polls (or possibly polls in general) show the same I would be shocked. So will Cameron.
They can't really do a last minute believable vow either.
Apparently ORB changed the question they ask to the one that will actually be on the ballot.
Really? What were they asking before? Why didn't they change it earlier?
Odd.
FFS, "hey guys, should we ask the actual question?"
The most revealing post this week for me was the one from foxinsox who was complaining his Dad was a leaver because he'd seen foreigners on the motorway and working in Aldis. Ah but, says fox, you have it all wrong, the EU is blah blah blah.
But his old man knows what he sees and he knows how he'll vote, he takes a look at every successive PM, Obama, Merkel and Junker and doesn't trust them an inch. This is his chance to send them all a message.
Old Top Gear was tired, about 1 or 2 seasons from being cancelled IMO. Clarkson hit upon a lucky way out just in time. Last night was okay, mainly awkward because it was different. Reminded me of series one of Top Gear. Needs to find its own voice.
Otherwise in politics feeling quite LEAVEy at the moment. Democratic deficit in EU potentially bigger risk than economic hit IMO. Probably will default to REMAIN, but can't deny feelings are there.
Agreed old Top Gear was tired, but last night wasn't new or different IMO. Same format, and rehash of lots of previous stunts. Laser tag in cars, check, "un"-reliant robin gag, check, race up a mountain in 4x4, check.
Extra Gear online show was at least something different and presenters showed promise of something similar but different, and without it being forced.
Top Gear with Clarkson et al was NEVER a 'vehicle for vehicles' or merely a car show. It was a show about 3 middle aged men - an iconoclast "POWER!!! How hard can it be?", the intelligent cerebral one with long hair and no sense of direction "Pinky and Perky are coming. ....and that's how an internal combustion engine works.", and the tiny sometimes iritating Brummie of no fixed ability, but of limitless energy and optimism - who had a combined mental age of about 40, and the antics and adventures they got up to, which we shared vicariously, like a roller coaster ride we all hung on to, teenagers again, if only for an hour.
It was the obviously close relationship between them which made it work, the teasing, the nicknames "Hamster, Captain Slow, the Orang Utang". The show framework reflected them rather than vice versa. It was like eavesdropping on 3 15 year old boys on a day out, indulging their silly jokes and immaturities, and thoroughly enjoying sharing the experience.
The new Top Gear will have to find its own format and chemistry. The question is whether lightning will strike twice. Somehow I doubt it.
I have not seen the new show yet - it's on at 9pm eastern this evening.
Old Top Gear was tired, about 1 or 2 seasons from being cancelled IMO. Clarkson hit upon a lucky way out just in time. Last night was okay, mainly awkward because it was different. Reminded me of series one of Top Gear. Needs to find its own voice.
Otherwise in politics feeling quite LEAVEy at the moment. Democratic deficit in EU potentially bigger risk than economic hit IMO. Probably will default to REMAIN, but can't deny feelings are there.
A possible Labour leave from you? In Horsham? Wow.
The Remain campaign has had more than a hint of "nanny knows best" and that the population should not be stupid and do as it's told. Democracy doesn't work that way. Or at least it shouldn't. The electorate needs to assert itself, somehow.
From that ORB poll in Telegraph. The LEAVE lead on immigration has increased by 8 to +29. Leave deficit on jobs down from 15 to 7. Leave deficit on economy down from 21 to 9
If I had to place a bet now this second, I'd say LEAVE is going to win this, because: immigration.
But I don't and I won't, so I will stick with my predix of REMAIN by 56/44
But, still, wow... Conniptions in SW1
I'd be ramming immigration down the throats of the Remainians between now and election day and doing it relentlessly. Making them gag on it remorselessly; until they choke on the cold hard facts.
There's nothing racist or illiberal or distasteful about mentioning the failure of successive governments to understand immigration. Raising the issue of uncontrolled, unlimited immigration onto a small, highly-indebted island country is sensible. Pure commonsense - and something I reckon a huge majority of voters want raised.
It's commonsense pragmatism and genuine concern versus crass fucking stupidity. Stupidity led by metropolitan luvvies and multiculturalism-is-fab (as long as you ignore divided cities like Blackburn) types who resent Britain. Usually rich and detached enough to not understand working class concerns. Usually on the left. Usually wrong.
Remain lead down to 5 points from 13 point last week with ORB phone poll
An 8 point move to leave in a week?
These polls are not that believable.
Choose your prejudice then pick the poll you like.
For a two horse race, the pollsters don't appear to have a clue...
Quite. An 8 point move in a week would be seismic. If other phone polls (or possibly polls in general) show the same I would be shocked. So will Cameron.
They can't really do a last minute believable vow either.
I am simultaneously terrified, mesmerised and rhapsodised by this campaign
I expected LEAVE to be chaotic. I never expected REMAIN to be so utterly shit.
I'll tell you why the Remain campaign is shit, it's because the EU is shit. They can't pretend that the EU is wonderful and campaign positively, people wouldn't take it seriously because we all know the EU is shit, even when it tries to do something good (take the zero rating of feminine hygiene products) it turns to shit. Instinctively there are very, very few British people actually in favour of our EU membership, probably fewer than 20% of people would vote in favour of joining the EU today had we never joined. Remain are paddling up stream and the EU is flinging shit at their faces while they do it. If any other political campaign had seen the mainstream left and right unite behind a single issue, it would have 60-70% support, AV was a perfect example of this, where pretty much the mainstream left and right united behind the current system and since it wasn't shit, people voted to keep it. You can polish a turd and serve it with a salad, but in the end, people are still going to realise they are being served a turd, which is what the EU is.
What strikes me is the nonchalance many lefties show towards a possible BREXIT.
Just on pb, we have Jonathan expressing ambivalence. And Mike Smithson apparently contemplating an OUT vote to screw the Tories. Even NPXMP doesn't seem particularly horrified by the idea of LEAVE.
I expected all three to be utterly fervent REMAINIACS.
Then Sandy Rentool, and so on.
If this is repeated across the country....
Because one failing of Leave is to have allowed the debate to be framed in terms of infighting within the Conservative Party.
We might have a further development which would again focus attention on the Conservatives.
All of this marginalises the left.
Whose fault this is, who knows? Either an abnegation of its responsibilities by the left, or a solipsistic obsession by the right.
This doesn't make any sense. It clearly benefits LEAVE for this vote to be seen as an internecine Tory battle, the result of which might be the harming of the Tory party, and the departure of Cameron, if LEAVE wins.
This is a huge incentive for lefties to sit on their hands, or even vote OUT
Add in immigration and the NHS...
We could see a reversal of the Scottish referendum, where we get unexpectedly high turnout, but this might surprisingly benefit LEAVE. In Scotland everyone thought a big turnout would favour YES, but the opposite happened. The silent majority of Unionists got off their arses.
Is there a silent majority of eurosceptics?
It's strange. Lefties presumably have as many strong thoughts about our membership of the EU as righties. Hence if they see the debate monopolised by the Cons...well I don't know. Plenty of sensible lefties on here have made sensible arguments for Remain and look on the Cons infighting as risible.
As a non-lefty, I don't know which perception of the Conservative party is more appealing.
But his old man knows what he sees and he knows how he'll vote, he takes a look at every successive PM, Obama, Merkel and Junker and doesn't trust them an inch. This is his chance to send them all a message.
We keep being told that Leave won't win, Trump won't win, Le Pen won't win, AfD won't win and so on. Sooner or later there will be a shock result.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
If leave win, expect a compliant Conservative party. The leavers will be delighted. The remainers will know they threw everything at the electorate and lost.
Nope.
Many of the Cons Remainers are at their wits end. There may well be a more dramatic consequence.
The Remain side is Cameron, Osborne and some of the payroll vote. If the PM had come out for Leave he would have carried 80-90% of MPs. There is no enthusiasm for Remain within the party outside of the federalists who are few in number and talk in hushed tones because they know their brand of EUfanaticism is complete poison.
If the people vote for Leave the party will fall in line in short order, if the Tories try and ignore the will of the people then I expect the government will fall, Dave and George will be cast aside and Gove will take over in the interim and fight the election vs Corbyn.
The will of the people will be for Leave, but what kind of Leave? It only takes a few Tories to wipe out the majority.
Leave is leave, it means leaving the EU. Beyond that it doesn't really matter.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
If leave win, expect a compliant Conservative party. The leavers will be delighted. The remainers will know they threw everything at the electorate and lost.
Nope.
Many of the Cons Remainers are at their wits end. There may well be a more dramatic consequence.
So if there is a leave vote in the referendum, the remainers will try to do what? Agitate for a re entry?
Which of course they would be perfectly entitled to do. No, but if you look at Lab and Cons they both have extreme wings (one man's extreme....yes I accept) and a centrist tendency.
As we have discussed on here at length, the problem for Lab is that many, apart from Jezza, have been accused of being Tory-lite. Meanwhile, in the Cons, it seems that Tory-liters have been faced by Tory-heavies. What more sensible route forward than for the two Tory-lite factions to come together?
Are you so wedded to the EU that you would call for a "unity" government to defy the will of the people? Have you been raiding the drinks cabinet tonight or something?
Not at all. I am anti-wedded to extremists on both sides. If MPs decide to eschew extremism, present themselves to the public as non Marxist, non super right wingers and allow the public to make a decision, well so be it.
And completely ignore the will of the people who have just voted in favour of leaving. If you think that is a realistic proposition then UKIP most seats is available at 150 with Coral and a majority at 200 with SkyBet!
Old Top Gear was tired, about 1 or 2 seasons from being cancelled IMO. Clarkson hit upon a lucky way out just in time. Last night was okay, mainly awkward because it was different. Reminded me of series one of Top Gear. Needs to find its own voice.
Otherwise in politics feeling quite LEAVEy at the moment. Democratic deficit in EU potentially bigger risk than economic hit IMO. Probably will default to REMAIN, but can't deny feelings are there.
A possible Labour leave from you? In Horsham? Wow.
The Remain campaign has had more than a hint of "nanny knows best" and that the population should not be stupid and do as it's told. Democracy doesn't work that way. Or at least it shouldn't. The electorate needs to assert itself, somehow.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
If leave win, expect a compliant Conservative party. The leavers will be delighted. The remainers will know they threw everything at the electorate and lost.
Nope.
Many of the Cons Remainers are at their wits end. There may well be a more dramatic consequence.
The Remain side is Cameron, Osborne and some of the payroll vote. If the PM had come out for Leave he would have carried 80-90% of MPs. There is no enthusiasm for Remain within the party outside of the federalists who are few in number and talk in hushed tones because they know their brand of EUfanaticism is complete poison.
If the people vote for Leave the party will fall in line in short order, if the Tories try and ignore the will of the people then I expect the government will fall, Dave and George will be cast aside and Gove will take over in the interim and fight the election vs Corbyn.
The will of the people will be for Leave, but what kind of Leave? It only takes a few Tories to wipe out the majority.
It also takes the SNP insisting that a Referendum victory for Leave can be ignored. Is that a precedence they want to set?
I would think the SNP would insist on tabling an amendment for a Scottish Independence referendum first but not to block a Leave altogether.
But his old man knows what he sees and he knows how he'll vote, he takes a look at every successive PM, Obama, Merkel and Junker and doesn't trust them an inch. This is his chance to send them all a message.
We keep being told that Leave won't win, Trump won't win, Le Pen won't win, AfD won't win and so on. Sooner or later there will be a shock result.
Yep, and then the cat is out of the bag. In the event of Leave politicians will have no option but to be more honest or be openly derided, we're all sick of it.
Rubbish. RemaIN allows us to unite with other people. Surely a noble thing - not being an isolationist and anti-foreigner.
The EU makes us isolationist. It makes us have an immigration policy that says a European with no education and no skills is more welcome in our country than an Indian, Chinese or African with higher education and a valuable skill set.
The EU is the epitome of isolationist protectionism.
The bit that people making this argument always omit is that our relationship with the EU is mutual. Yes, any of them can come here but, by the same token, any of us can go there. It's freedom of movement, not just immigration. And it's a far stretch of the imagination to describe this as isolationist!
Of course it is isolationist. We exclude 93% of the world's population not on the basis of whether or not they have anything to offer our country but just because they don't come from a particular political grouping. It is ridiculous, just like everything else about the EU.
Why do you insist on ignoring the fact that freedom of movement also gives all of us the right to live and work in any EU country? It's not all about immigration. How exactly is taking away that right supposed to make the UK less isolationist?
Each country should be able to determine its immigration policy based on what serves its own needs best. I certainly don't consider Australia isolationist, nor Canada. Both have immigration policies based on what is in the best interest of their economies and their ability to absorb new population. They have high rates of migration because that is what they need but they get the chance to pick the people they want. I fail to see what is so bad about that policy? It is certainly better than the current policy we have of white Europeans good, non whites from the rest of the world bad.
You continue to studiously ignore my point that the same freedom of movement policy that allows all EU citizens to come here also allows all UK citizens to live in any EU country. Removing the right of UK citizens to settle in any of the other 27 EU states cannot be rationally described as an anti-isolationist policy. Once again: freedom of movement is not all about immigration; it's also about the giving UK citizens the freedom to emigrate. Why are you so reluctant to acknowledge this?
Remain lead down to 5 points from 13 point last week with ORB phone poll
An 8 point move to leave in a week?
These polls are not that believable.
Choose your prejudice then pick the poll you like.
For a two horse race, the pollsters don't appear to have a clue...
Quite. An 8 point move in a week would be seismic. If other phone polls (or possibly polls in general) show the same I would be shocked. So will Cameron.
They can't really do a last minute believable vow either.
I am simultaneously terrified, mesmerised and rhapsodised by this campaign
I expected LEAVE to be chaotic. I never expected REMAIN to be so utterly shit.
we all know the EU is shit, even when it tries to do something good (take the zero rating of feminine hygiene products) it turns to shit.
Remain lead down to 5 points from 13 point last week with ORB phone poll
An 8 point move to leave in a week?
These polls are not that believable.
Choose your prejudice then pick the poll you like.
For a two horse race, the pollsters don't appear to have a clue...
Quite. An 8 point move in a week would be seismic. If other phone polls (or possibly polls in general) show the same I would be shocked. So will Cameron.
They can't really do a last minute believable vow either.
Apparently ORB changed the question they ask to the one that will actually be on the ballot.
From that ORB poll in Telegraph. The LEAVE lead on immigration has increased by 8 to +29. Leave deficit on jobs down from 15 to 7. Leave deficit on economy down from 21 to 9
It's only one poll, and it is a small sample size but if repeated Cameron will have issues.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get through the Commons? Without a GE first it is hard to see how. And a GE under such circumstances will be fought on current boundaries. The next few years are going to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
If leave win, expect a compliant Conservative party. The leavers will be delighted. The remainers will know they threw everything at the electorate and lost.
Nope.
Many of the Cons Remainers are at their wits end. There may well be a more dramatic consequence.
The Remain side is Cameron, Osborne and some of the payroll vote. If the PM had come out for Leave he would have carried 80-90% of MPs. There is no enthusiasm for Remain within the party outside of the federalists who are few in number and talk in hushed tones because they know their brand of EUfanaticism is complete poison.
If the people vote for Leave the party will fall in line in short order, if the Tories try and ignore the will of the people then I expect the government will fall, Dave and George will be cast aside and Gove will take over in the interim and fight the election vs Corbyn.
The will of the people will be for Leave, but what kind of Leave? It only takes a few Tories to wipe out the majority.
Leave is leave, it means leaving the EU. Beyond that it doesn't really matter.
Not sure I buy that. Will all Tory MPs vote for a Brexit deal that ends passporting for the City? Would they vote for one that preserves free movement, or one that introduces passport checks and a customs border between the mainland and Northern Ireland? And so on.
Rubbish. RemaIN allows us to unite with other people. Surely a noble thing - not being an isolationist and anti-foreigner.
The EU makes us isolationist. It makes us have an immigration policy that says a European with no education and no skills is more welcome in our country than an Indian, Chinese or African with higher education and a valuable skill set.
The EU is the epitome of isolationist protectionism.
The bit that people making this argument always omit is that our relationship with the EU is mutual. Yes, any of them can come here but, by the same token, any of us can go there. It's freedom of movement, not just immigration. And it's a far stretch of the imagination to describe this as isolationist!
Of course it is isolationist. We exclude 93% of the world's population not on the basis of whether or not they have anything to offer our country but just because they don't come from a particular political grouping. It is ridiculous, just like everything else about the EU.
Why do you insist on ignoring the fact that freedom of movement also gives all of us the right to live and work in any EU country? It's not all about immigration. How exactly is taking away that right supposed to make the UK less isolationist?
Each country should be able to determine its immigration policy based on what serves its own needs best. I certainly don't consider Australia isolationist, nor Canada. Both have immigration policies based on what is in the best interest of their economies and their ability to absorb new population. They have high rates of migration because that is what they need but they get the chance to pick the people they want. I fail to see what is so bad about that policy? It is certainly better than the current policy we have of white Europeans good, non whites from the rest of the world bad.
You continue to studiously ignore my point that the same freedom of movement policy that allows all EU citizens to come here also allows all UK citizens to live in any EU country. Removing the right of UK citizens to settle in any of the other 27 EU states cannot be rationally described as an anti-isolationist policy. Once again: freedom of movement is not all about immigration; it's also about the giving UK citizens the freedom to emigrate. Why are you so reluctant to acknowledge this?
Look put simply who the hell wants to emigrate to Romania? The reverse doesn't apply.
From that ORB poll in Telegraph. The LEAVE lead on immigration has increased by 8 to +29. Leave deficit on jobs down from 15 to 7. Leave deficit on economy down from 21 to 9
Last week's ORB poll was probably a rogue. It was out of kilter at the time and this week has in part seen a simple reversion to mean.
The Remain campaign pulls out its best weapon, the wardrobe with its key well under control - on your marks, Nicholas Soames!
Says Soamesy, "For the benefit of the commentariat before they become too over excited, this Tory MP called Bridgend has absolutely no battalions at call"
What does it mean to become "too over excited"? Is that different from "too excited" or "overexcited"? And what does it mean to have "absolutely no battalions" rather than just "no battalions"?
This poor guy can't see himself from the outsi-hide!
Does he know the difference between countering an argument and calling the person who makes it a weakling?
Rubbish. RemaIN allows us to unite with other people. Surely a noble thing - not being an isolationist and anti-foreigner.
The EU makes us isolationist. It makes us have an immigration policy that says a European with no education and no skills is more welcome in our country than an Indian, Chinese or African with higher education and a valuable skill set.
The EU is the epitome of isolationist protectionism.
The bit that people making this argument always omit is that our relationship with the EU is mutual. Yes, any of them can come here but, by the same token, any of us can go there. It's freedom of movement, not just immigration. And it's a far stretch of the imagination to describe this as isolationist!
Of course it is isolationist. We exclude 93% of the world's population not on the basis of whether or not they have anything to offer our country but just because they don't come from a particular political grouping. It is ridiculous, just like everything else about the EU.
Why do you insist on ignoring the fact that freedom of movement also gives all of us the right to live and work in any EU country? It's not all about immigration. How exactly is taking away that right supposed to make the UK less isolationist?
Each country should be able to determine its immigration policy based on what serves its own needs best. I certainly don't consider Australia isolationist, nor Canada. Both have immigration policies based on what is in the best interest of their economies and their ability to absorb new population. They have high rates of migration because that is what they need but they get the chance to pick the people they want. I fail to see what is so bad about that policy? It is certainly better than the current policy we have of white Europeans good, non whites from the rest of the world bad.
You continue to studiously ignore my point that the same freedom of movement policy that allows all EU citizens to come here also allows all UK citizens to live in any EU country. Removing the right of UK citizens to settle in any of the other 27 EU states cannot be rationally described as an anti-isolationist policy. Once again: freedom of movement is not all about immigration; it's also about the giving UK citizens the freedom to emigrate. Why are you so reluctant to acknowledge this?
There is a booming business where people swap homes for a couple of weeks holiday. As a rule, residents of Moss Side don't trade places with those in Malibu Beach. Not many of us are queueing up to get into Bucharest.
Not sure I buy that. Will all Tory MPs vote for a Brexit deal that ends passporting for the City? Would they vote for one that preserves free movement, or one that introduces passport checks and a customs border between the mainland and Northern Ireland? And so on.
I don't see that they have a choice, it obviously depends on what the PM presents to the people, again referring back to the report, we expect there to be an election and bloodletting within the Tory party after which the people will be asked to back either the EEA with free movement or WTO with some other kind of immigration system. It's the only way the issue will be settled and I think that the first option will get majority support.
Earlier today Ladbrokes were offering 7-1 on a Leave win with a turnout of less than 65% and 8-1 on a Leave win with a turnout of over 65%. If you did not get on those you were very foolish. I wonder if the 4-1 on a straight Leave win is still available. I'm on that too.
What strikes me is the nonchalance many lefties show towards a possible BREXIT.
Just on pb, we have Jonathan expressing ambivalence. And Mike Smithson apparently contemplating an OUT vote to screw the Tories. Even NPXMP doesn't seem particularly horrified by the idea of LEAVE.
I expected all three to be utterly fervent REMAINIACS.
Then Sandy Rentool, and so on.
If this is repeated across the country....
Remain does not have the passion of Leave but probably a majority will still grudgingly vote for it but it will be close as tonight's poll confirms
Earlier today Ladbrokes were offering 7-1 on a Leave win with a turnout of less than 65% and 8-1 on a Leave win with a turnout of over 65%. If you did not get on those you were very foolish. I wonder if the 4-1 on a straight Leave win is still available. I'm on that too.
It is. See my post.
To me that is completely incomprehensible.
What were the closest the odds got in the Scottish referendum? I can't remember if it ever got close.
What strikes me is the nonchalance many lefties show towards a possible BREXIT.
Just on pb, we have Jonathan expressing ambivalence. And Mike Smithson apparently contemplating an OUT vote to screw the Tories. Even NPXMP doesn't seem particularly horrified by the idea of LEAVE.
I expected all three to be utterly fervent REMAINIACS.
Then Sandy Rentool, and so on.
If this is repeated across the country....
Remain does not have the passion of Leave but probably a majority will still grudgingly vote for it but it will be close as tonight's poll confirms
The 10/10 have been shocking for Remain for ages. Most are clocking in at 65-75% turnout.
We should be getting the ICM online poll tomorrow.
As for any other polls, I'm not aware of any other polls due apart from the Opinium poll for the Observer which is usually out on Saturday evening.
I suspect pollsters are wary of conducting polls during the Bank Holidays, but this weekend/next week should see a lot more polling to see if this ORB is a harbinger or an outlier
The real fun starts when we vote to Leave and we all find out what that actually means. Will any package agreed by a new PM and Chancellor get throughg to be electrical politically and very tough economically. No-one is going to be doing much investing until a degree of certainty emerges.
If leave win, expect a compliant Conservative party. The leavers will be delighted. The remainers will know they threw everything at the electorate and lost.
Nope.
Many of the Cons Remainers are at their wits end. There may well be a more dramatic consequence.
So if there is a leave vote in the referendum, the remainers will try to do what? Agitate for a re entry?
Which of course they would be perfectly entitled to do. No, but if you look at Lab and Cons they both have extreme wings (one man's extreme....yes I accept) and a centrist tendency.
As we have discussed on here at length, the problem for Lab is that many, apart from Jezza, have been accused of being Tory-lite. Meanwhile, in the Cons, it seems that Tory-liters have been faced by Tory-heavies. What more sensible route forward than for the two Tory-lite factions to come together?
Are you so wedded to the EU that you would call for a "unity" government to defy the will of the people? Have you been raiding the drinks cabinet tonight or something?
Not at all. I am anti-wedded to extremists on both sides. If MPs decide to eschew extremism, present themselves to the public as non Marxist, non super right wingers and allow the public to make a decision, well so be it.
And completely ignore the will of the people who have just voted in favour of leaving. If you think that is a realistic proposition then UKIP most seats is available at 150 with Coral and a majority at 200 with SkyBet!
I am obviously not explaining myself clearly. My point was that it is not beyond the realms of the possible that if Leave does win, it will be seen as a victory for the right of the Conservative Party, and those not on the right of the Conservative Party might look at their options. Those options might not be hugely dissimilar from those on the right of the Labour Party. Both wings might therefore join together to form a new kind of party.
Nothing to do with the will of the people; they will have spoken.
Not sure I buy that. Will all Tory MPs vote for a Brexit deal that ends passporting for the City? Would they vote for one that preserves free movement, or one that introduces passport checks and a customs border between the mainland and Northern Ireland? And so on.
I don't see that they have a choice, it obviously depends on what the PM presents to the people, again referring back to the report, we expect there to be an election and bloodletting within the Tory party after which the people will be asked to back either the EEA with free movement or WTO with some other kind of immigration system. It's the only way the issue will be settled and I think that the first option will get majority support.
Yep, if there is a GE before the negotiations are voted on by the Commons that makes sense. But voters sold a story of big cuts in immigration will not buy EFTA/EEA and the City will be totally opposed to falling back on the WTO. It's going to be interesting.
Almost all the Remain I come into contact with elsewhere have property, business, family or employment currently, or previously, from abroad. Some feel the EU fund their jobs.
Almost all the Remain I come into contact with elsewhere have property, family or employment currently, or previously, from abroad. Some feel the EU fund their jobs.
If they are representative Remain should get no more than around two million votes and Leave will win easily.
What strikes me is the nonchalance many lefties show towards a possible BREXIT.
Just on pb, we have Jonathan expressing ambivalence. And Mike Smithson apparently contemplating an OUT vote to screw the Tories. Even NPXMP doesn't seem particularly horrified by the idea of LEAVE.
I expected all three to be utterly fervent REMAINIACS.
Then Sandy Rentool, and so on.
If this is repeated across the country....
Remain does not have the passion of Leave but probably a majority will still grudgingly vote for it but it will be close as tonight's poll confirms
Still having trouble seeing which way it will go.
Kunsberg said polls show that there are 10 million enthusiastic leavers with only 5 million enthusiastic remainsers.
I think that is key.
I also know that firm remainers are being turned towards leave by the remain campaign rather than the leave one. Just like in Scotland.
We should be getting the ICM online poll tomorrow.
As for any other polls, I'm not aware of any other polls due apart from the Opinium poll for the Observer which is usually out on Saturday evening.
I suspect pollsters are wary of conducting polls during the Bank Holidays, but this weekend/next week should see a lot more polling
As a convinced Cameroon, what do you expect Dave to do if he loses?
I reckon he'll go within a few weeks, even though he might be minded to stay.
If Leave wins, and Dave plans to continue to go on past the conference, I'd hate to be Graham Brady's postman.
If Leave wins, Friday morning he'll appoint Gove Minister for Brexit, and announce his departure date and trigger the start of the Tory leadership contest, with a new leader in place for conference in early October.
We should be getting the ICM online poll tomorrow.
As for any other polls, I'm not aware of any other polls due apart from the Opinium poll for the Observer which is usually out on Saturday evening.
I suspect pollsters are wary of conducting polls during the Bank Holidays, but this weekend/next week should see a lot more polling
As a convinced Cameroon, what do you expect Dave to do if he loses?
I reckon he'll go within a few weeks, even though he might be minded to stay.
If Hilton is right and he is a closet Brexiteer he would have played a blinder. Played every dirty trick in the book to win (perhaps knowing it would lose) so he can then negotiate a deal in good faith.
I am obviously not explaining myself clearly. My point was that it is not beyond the realms of the possible that if Leave does win, it will be seen as a victory for the right of the Conservative Party, and those not on the right of the Conservative Party might look at their options. Those options might not be hugely dissimilar from those on the right of the Labour Party. Both wings might therefore join together to form a new kind of party.
Nothing to do with the will of the people; they will have spoken.
Those MPs would be and they would be joining up with the right of the Labour party which is still pretty left of centre. I don't see how Yvette could ever be in the Tory party. The numbers you are talking about are limited to maybe 20 Tory MPs and maybe 30 Labour ones who could over run the Lib Dems and make Osborne the new Lib Dem leader. All of this over a subject that rates at between 3 and 7 points with the public on any normal occasion? Even some one like Ken Clark is fairly right wing outside of his EUfanaticism, any party based on love of the EU is going to have some pretty disparate views elsewhere on economic, social, justice and defence matters. UKIP barely hold themselves together as a party against the EU because they have tried to walk the WWC path at the same time as the Carswell libertarian path. I can't imagine what a EUFED party would look like.
Anecdata have me shifting from thinking the 33% implied leave was optimistic (as a Leaver) to the 20% being pessimistic. Granted, both could be true. Nobody I expected in my circle to be a Leaver has turned out to be a Remainer. Several I expect to be firm Remainers have turned out ambivalent - a Maths Professor I saw earlier with a Leave badge on, a Yoga instructor who told me "bureaucracy breeds bureaucracy" and is voting Leave, and a child protection co-ordinator in local government who has been reading everything she can get hold of and still can't decide.
We should be getting the ICM online poll tomorrow.
As for any other polls, I'm not aware of any other polls due apart from the Opinium poll for the Observer which is usually out on Saturday evening.
I suspect pollsters are wary of conducting polls during the Bank Holidays, but this weekend/next week should see a lot more polling
As a convinced Cameroon, what do you expect Dave to do if he loses?
I reckon he'll go within a few weeks, even though he might be minded to stay.
If Leave wins, and Dave plans to continue to go on past the conference, I'd hate to be Graham Brady's postman.
If Leave wins, Friday morning he'll appoint Gove Minister for Brexit, and announce his departure date and trigger the start of the Tory leadership contest, with a new leader in place for conference in early October.
Yes, I agree. I reckon he'd stay on for a month or two to provide stability, do the decent thing and all that, but the shame and humiliation of defeat would be so great he'd quit (even though there are swirling rumours that he'd ideally like to hang on, even after Brexit)
His position will be untenable at home and, just as important, abroad. Who'd deal with him knowing he cannot lead his party, let alone the country?
The EU makes us isolationist. It makes us have an immigration policy that says a European with no education and no skills is more welcome in our country than an Indian, Chinese or African with higher education and a valuable skill set.
The EU is the epitome of isolationist protectionism.
The bit that people making this argument always omit is that our relationship with the EU is mutual. Yes, any of them can come here but, by the same token, any of us can go there. It's freedom of movement, not just immigration. And it's a far stretch of the imagination to describe this as isolationist!
Of course it is isolationist. We exclude 93% of the world's population not on the basis of whether or not they have anything to offer our country but just because they don't come from a particular political grouping. It is ridiculous, just like everything else about the EU.
Why do you insist on ignoring the fact that freedom of movement also gives all of us the right to live and work in any EU country? It's not all about immigration. How exactly is taking away that right supposed to make the UK less isolationist?
Each country should be able to determine its immigration policy based on what serves its own needs best. I certainly don't consider Australia isolationist, nor Canada. Both have immigration policies based on what is in the best interest of their economies and their ability to absorb new population. They have high rates of migration because that is what they need but they get the chance to pick the people they want. I fail to see what is so bad about that policy? It is certainly better than the current policy we have of white Europeans good, non whites from the rest of the world bad.
You continue to studiously ignore my point that the same freedom of movement policy that allows all EU citizens to come here also allows all UK citizens to live in any EU country. Removing the right of UK citizens to settle in any of the other 27 EU states cannot be rationally described as an anti-isolationist policy. Once again: freedom of movement is not all about immigration; it's also about the giving UK citizens the freedom to emigrate. Why are you so reluctant to acknowledge this?
Look put simply who the hell wants to emigrate to Romania? The reverse doesn't apply.
The EU is not just Romania. Some 1.2 million Brits are currently exercising their right to settle in other EU countries.
We should be getting the ICM online poll tomorrow.
As for any other polls, I'm not aware of any other polls due apart from the Opinium poll for the Observer which is usually out on Saturday evening.
I suspect pollsters are wary of conducting polls during the Bank Holidays, but this weekend/next week should see a lot more polling
As a convinced Cameroon, what do you expect Dave to do if he loses?
I reckon he'll go within a few weeks, even though he might be minded to stay.
If Leave wins, and Dave plans to continue to go on past the conference, I'd hate to be Graham Brady's postman.
If Leave wins, Friday morning he'll appoint Gove Minister for Brexit, and announce his departure date and trigger the start of the Tory leadership contest, with a new leader in place for conference in early October.
I'd like Frank Field and IDS in there too.
It also has to be said, how many letters Brady ends up having on file will be very dependent on how Cameron plays a leave win.
If he comes out in the morning, says the people have spoken.... We've heard.... Now we will negotiate will the EU a leave deal, and negotiate free trade elsewhere... he could hang on for a while.
Winners don't need to kick the loser in the face. Losers feel like kicking the winner any where they can.
Last week ORB good poll for Remain, twitter Leavers saying ORB tiny sample size, ignore.
This week, ORB = Gold Standard.
Well if it's true that they have adjusted their methodology so they actually ask the question on the ballot, then yes they are closer to the Gold Standard than before.
But who the hell knows. The polls are ridiculously wobbly.
It must be terrifying for Cameron, like skating for a gold medal on deadly thin ice.
The previous question they were asking wasn't that far from the ballot paper, I suspect this is a genuine shift, rather a methodology led change.
During the Indyref when the pollsters changed the question to what was on the ballot paper, it made no difference.
Anecdata have me shifting from thinking the 33% implied leave was optimistic (as a Leaver) to the 20% being pessimistic. Granted, both could be true.
I can't think what definition of "truth" you are using that applies to the probability of a vote result. It is not a physical reality capable of being measured.
Not sure I buy that. Will all Tory MPs vote for a Brexit deal that ends passporting for the City? Would they vote for one that preserves free movement, or one that introduces passport checks and a customs border between the mainland and Northern Ireland? And so on.
I don't see that they have a choice, it obviously depends on what the PM presents to the people, again referring back to the report, we expect there to be an election and bloodletting within the Tory party after which the people will be asked to back either the EEA with free movement or WTO with some other kind of immigration system. It's the only way the issue will be settled and I think that the first option will get majority support.
Yep, if there is a GE before the negotiations are voted on by the Commons that makes sense. But voters sold a story of big cuts in immigration will not buy EFTA/EEA and the City will be totally opposed to falling back on the WTO. It's going to be interesting.
It will be interesting and worrying and destabilising, but it will also be utterly brilliant for British democracy. Finally - finally - we will have a serious debate about what we really want, in terms of immigration, identity, everything, without this terrible, enervating feeling that it's all pointless, as everything is decided by faceless eurocrats in Brussels, and that we are forever bound by obscure laws we cannot repeal.
Power fill flood back to the people. Even the most ardent europhile must see the political and romantic appeal of that.
One of the big differences between this and the Scottish referendum is that the UK was independent of the EU within living memory.
This poll is a big move - yet Betfair has only gone from around 5.2 (last night) to 4.7 now.
Of course it's only one poll and I think the Crosby article is a bit more positive for Remain than the headline poll numbers.
In particular the Wisdom Index is still very heavily expecting a Remain win - and history suggests the Wisdom Index is usually a good pointer - it's not normally wrong in a big way.
Suspect conclusion may therefore be that Wisdom Index is pointing to an expectation that some people will bottle it at the last minute - ie in order to win, Leave needs to actually be about 3% ahead on the night before voting day.
Anecdata have me shifting from thinking the 33% implied leave was optimistic (as a Leaver) to the 20% being pessimistic. Granted, both could be true. Nobody I expected in my circle to be a Leaver has turned out to be a Remainer. Several I expect to be firm Remainers have turned out ambivalent - a Maths Professor I saw earlier with a Leave badge on, a Yoga instructor who told me "bureaucracy breeds bureaucracy" and is voting Leave, and a child protection co-ordinator in local government who has been reading everything she can get hold of and still can't decide.
Interesting. I can't tell you which way the farming vote down my way is going though.
This poll is a big move - yet Betfair has only gone from around 5.2 (last night) to 4.7 now.
Of course it's only one poll and I think the Crosby article is a bit more positive for Remain than the headline poll numbers.
In particular the Wisdom Index is still very heavily expecting a Remain win - and history suggests the Wisdom Index is usually a good pointer - it's not normally wrong in a big way.
suspect conclusion may therefore be that Wisdom Index is pointing to an expectation that some people will bottle it at the last minute.
I think a lot of people are putting faith in the phone polls, Matt Singh's analysis, and ComRes abandoning online polling for the EURef.
The EU makes us isolationist. It makes us have an immigration policy that says a European with no education and no skills is more welcome in our country than an Indian, Chinese or African with higher education and a valuable skill set.
The EU is the epitome of isolationist protectionism.
The bit that people making this argument always omit is that our relationship with the EU is mutual. Yes, any of them can come here but, by the same token, any of us can go there. It's freedom of movement, not just immigration. And it's a far stretch of the imagination to describe this as isolationist!
Of course it is isolationist. We exclude 93% of the world's population not on the basis of whether or not they have anything to offer our country but just because they don't come from a particular political grouping. It is ridiculous, just like everything else about the EU.
Why do you insist on ignoring the fact that freedom of movement also gives all of us the right to live and work in any EU country? It's not all about immigration. How exactly is taking away that right supposed to make the UK less isolationist?
Each country should be able to determine its immigration policy based on what serves its own needs best. I certainly don't consider Australia isolationist, nor Canada. Both have immigration policies based on what is in the best interest of their economies and their ability to absorb new population. They have high rates of migration because that is what they need but they get the chance to pick the people they want. I fail to see what is so bad about that policy? It is certainly better than the current policy we have of white Europeans good, non whites from the rest of the world bad.
You continue to studiously ignore my point that the same freedom of movement policy that allows all EU citizens to come here also allows all UK citizens to live in any EU country. Removing the right of UK citizens to settle in any of the other 27 EU states cannot be rationally described as an anti-isolationist policy. Once again: freedom of movement is not all about immigration; it's also about the giving UK citizens the freedom to emigrate. Why are you so reluctant to acknowledge this?
Look put simply who the hell wants to emigrate to Romania? The reverse doesn't apply.
The EU is not just Romania. Some 1.2 million Brits are currently exercising their right to settle in other EU countries.
Picture it: two days before the vote a flotilla of boats capsizes in the Channel and dozens drown. Dead babies are washed up on the Kentish shingle. It turns out many are Kosovans and Albanians happily shooed across the frontiers by Schengen...
I will stop there, because it is distasteful to go further.
But it is easy to see how this ongoing news story could affect the referendum.
It hurts remain more than "normal" refugee/migrant smuggling stories because those are normally North African or Syrian, the people being smuggled at the moment are Albanian and Kosovan. Both of those nations are in Europe, though not in the EU, they won't be seen as some kind of persecuted refugee, they will be seen as a bunch of chancers who are just using the current crisis to try and come here to seek economic gain, the EU's porous border is going to be under the spotlight again.
Last week ORB good poll for Remain, twitter Leavers saying ORB tiny sample size, ignore.
This week, ORB = Gold Standard.
Well if it's true that they have adjusted their methodology so they actually ask the question on the ballot, then yes they are closer to the Gold Standard than before.
But who the hell knows. The polls are ridiculously wobbly.
It must be terrifying for Cameron, like skating for a gold medal on deadly thin ice.
The previous question they were asking wasn't that far from the ballot paper, I suspect this is a genuine shift, rather a methodology led change.
During the Indyref when the pollsters changed the question to what was on the ballot paper, it made no difference.
I agree. It was clear there was a public mood shift last week. Suddenly REMAINIANS stopped gloating and began to look nervy, and the bookies took a surge of bets on LEAVE.
MY country is as bipolar as me.
Want my theory, the UK wants to Remain in the EU, but they don't want a big Remain victory so the EU sees it as the UK endorsing Ever Closer Union or a United States of Europe, so they are voting accordingly to ensure a tepid Remain victory.
Not sure I buy that. Will all Tory MPs vote for a Brexit deal that ends passporting for the City? Would they vote for one that preserves free movement, or one that introduces passport checks and a customs border between the mainland and Northern Ireland? And so on.
I don't see that they have a choice, it obviously depends on what the PM presents to the people, again referring back to the report, we expect there to be an election and bloodletting within the Tory party after which the people will be asked to back either the EEA with free movement or WTO with some other kind of immigration system. It's the only way the issue will be settled and I think that the first option will get majority support.
Yep, if there is a GE before the negotiations are voted on by the Commons that makes sense. But voters sold a story of big cuts in immigration will not buy EFTA/EEA and the City will be totally opposed to falling back on the WTO. It's going to be interesting.
It will be interesting and worrying and destabilising, but it will also be utterly brilliant for British democracy. Finally - finally - we will have a serious debate about what we really want, in terms of immigration, identity, everything, without this terrible, enervating feeling that it's all pointless, as everything is decided by faceless eurocrats in Brussels, and that we are forever bound by obscure laws we cannot repeal.
Power fill flood back to the people. Even the most ardent europhile must see the political and romantic appeal of that.
If the debate would be as serious as the current debate about Europe, which is apparently the most serious debate in England and Wales since the last one about Europe, it would not be very serious. If it is anything like the farce of doubling to 365,000 net immigration on a 100,000 target, it is worryingly plausible that the ensuing debate would be even less serious than the Europe one at the moment.
Anecdote alert - got talking to someone yesterday ranting and raving about immigration destroying the fabric of this country and planning on voting remain as the lesser of two evils! Think I managed to persuade him to back leave at the end of our conversation, although I stressed the unfairness of favouring unskilled EU immigrants over highly skilled non-EU migrants - my miniscule contribution to the leave campaign!
This poll is a big move - yet Betfair has only gone from around 5.2 (last night) to 4.7 now.
Of course it's only one poll and I think the Crosby article is a bit more positive for Remain than the headline poll numbers.
In particular the Wisdom Index is still very heavily expecting a Remain win - and history suggests the Wisdom Index is usually a good pointer - it's not normally wrong in a big way.
Suspect conclusion may therefore be that Wisdom Index is pointing to an expectation that some people will bottle it at the last minute - ie in order to win, Leave needs to actually be about 3% ahead on the night before voting day.
The last ICM WI from May 2015
ICM’s final “wisdom of crowds index” – respondents’ averaged best guess of how each party will score – continues to put the Tories ahead on 35%, compared to 32% Labour. Voters also envisage the Lib Dems on 14%, ahead of Ukip on 10%, all figures that are unchanged from the provisional data.
While the Tory/Lab figures look reasonable, the LD/UKIP ones are horrendous.
I am looking forward to Dan Hodges explaining all this away.
Is he in touch with the working class in Hampstead?
I am not convinced many commentators in the media or even on here are very in touch with the working class.
Middle class area. Deliverers reporting to me that their LEAVE leaflets are being snapped up eagerly by tradesmen. Cynical hardened deliverers of 10+ years experience set back by the friendly welcomes on doorsteps when the householder intercepts the leaflet. We are close to running out and have half the 10,000 homes delivered. Some twice. People in the delivery team include Kippers, Cons, Lab and LD (yes!)
Well the Albanian attempted crossing of the Channel is certainly one of the 'events, dear boy events' that could really shake up this campaign. I still think everything has to go positive in the favour of remain between now and 3 weeks on Thursday. Chaos in France in the build up to Euro 2016 could be one of those wildcard events that could play in favour of the leave campaign.
Anecdata have me shifting from thinking the 33% implied leave was optimistic (as a Leaver) to the 20% being pessimistic. Granted, both could be true.
I can't think what definition of "truth" you are using that applies to the probability of a vote result. It is not a physical reality capable of being measured.
There is clearly at any given point an actual likelihood of something happening.
Between now and the end of voting day that will either rise to 100% or fall to 0%. Between now and then, it will rise and fall - the whole point of this site is surely to determine whether the betting markets are correctly judging where it lies at any given moment, and taking advantage if they do not.
The fact that this is one-shot means that, unlike say a roulette wheel, we'll never know what the true probability "really was" at any given point in the campaign, but it's entirely possible that it's currently below 33% but above 20%. If it rises to 100% on June 24th, people who claimed it was more like 60% will say they were "right". If it falls to 0%, people who claimed 20% was a fair price will say they were "right".
Of course it's entirely possible to be correct that the probability of something happening is 20%, but for that thing to happen. Doesn't make your assessment of the probability as 20% wrong, ex post.
Comments
So, lets get the pitch forks out and vote leave!
As we have discussed on here at length, the problem for Lab is that many, apart from Jezza, have been accused of being Tory-lite. Meanwhile, in the Cons, it seems that Tory-liters have been faced by Tory-heavies. What more sensible route forward than for the two Tory-lite factions to come together?
(With apologies to Python)
I hope we vote leave and we then have the negotiations we should've had exempting us from swathes of the EU ( CAP for bloody starters) except this time the leaders would know we mean if and default is now " out " not " in ". It'll concentrate minds.
If the people vote for Leave the party will fall in line in short order, if the Tories try and ignore the will of the people then I expect the government will fall, Dave and George will be cast aside and Gove will take over in the interim and fight the election vs Corbyn.
Odd.
We might have a further development which would again focus attention on the Conservatives.
All of this marginalises the left.
Whose fault this is, who knows? Either an abnegation of its responsibilities by the left, or a solipsistic obsession by the right.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2016/05/30/sir-lynton-crosby-brexit-focus-on-immigration-concerns-is-paying/
There's nothing racist or illiberal or distasteful about mentioning the failure of successive governments to understand immigration. Raising the issue of uncontrolled, unlimited immigration onto a small, highly-indebted island country is sensible. Pure commonsense - and something I reckon a huge majority of voters want raised.
It's commonsense pragmatism and genuine concern versus crass fucking stupidity. Stupidity led by metropolitan luvvies and multiculturalism-is-fab (as long as you ignore divided cities like Blackburn) types who resent Britain. Usually rich and detached enough to not understand working class concerns. Usually on the left. Usually wrong.
But his old man knows what he sees and he knows how he'll vote, he takes a look at every successive PM, Obama, Merkel and Junker and doesn't trust them an inch. This is his chance to send them all a message.
It was the obviously close relationship between them which made it work, the teasing, the nicknames "Hamster, Captain Slow, the Orang Utang". The show framework reflected them rather than vice versa. It was like eavesdropping on 3 15 year old boys on a day out, indulging their silly jokes and immaturities, and thoroughly enjoying sharing the experience.
The new Top Gear will have to find its own format and chemistry. The question is whether lightning will strike twice. Somehow I doubt it.
I have not seen the new show yet - it's on at 9pm eastern this evening.
The LEAVE lead on immigration has increased by 8 to +29.
Leave deficit on jobs down from 15 to 7.
Leave deficit on economy down from 21 to 9
As a non-lefty, I don't know which perception of the Conservative party is more appealing.
God it's like Escher's staircase.
Politicians should always fear voters. In part the EU is about removing that fear. It's wrong.
I would think the SNP would insist on tabling an amendment for a Scottish Independence referendum first but not to block a Leave altogether.
I wonder if he will tack to May's position?
Compare to the poll before last.
Says Soamesy, "For the benefit of the commentariat before they become too over excited, this Tory MP called Bridgend has absolutely no battalions at call"
What does it mean to become "too over excited"? Is that different from "too excited" or "overexcited"? And what does it mean to have "absolutely no battalions" rather than just "no battalions"?
This poor guy can't see himself from the outsi-hide!
Does he know the difference between countering an argument and calling the person who makes it a weakling?
What were the closest the odds got in the Scottish referendum? I can't remember if it ever got close.
As for any other polls, I'm not aware of any other polls due apart from the Opinium poll for the Observer which is usually out on Saturday evening.
I suspect pollsters are wary of conducting polls during the Bank Holidays, but this weekend/next week should see a lot more polling to see if this ORB is a harbinger or an outlier
Nothing to do with the will of the people; they will have spoken.
Kunsberg said polls show that there are 10 million enthusiastic leavers with only 5 million enthusiastic remainsers.
I think that is key.
I also know that firm remainers are being turned towards leave by the remain campaign rather than the leave one. Just like in Scotland.
If Leave wins, Friday morning he'll appoint Gove Minister for Brexit, and announce his departure date and trigger the start of the Tory leadership contest, with a new leader in place for conference in early October.
It's clutching at straws...
Last week ORB good poll for Remain, twitter Leavers saying ORB tiny sample size, ignore.
This week, ORB = Gold Standard.
It also has to be said, how many letters Brady ends up having on file will be very dependent on how Cameron plays a leave win.
If he comes out in the morning, says the people have spoken.... We've heard.... Now we will negotiate will the EU a leave deal, and negotiate free trade elsewhere... he could hang on for a while.
Winners don't need to kick the loser in the face. Losers feel like kicking the winner any where they can.
During the Indyref when the pollsters changed the question to what was on the ballot paper, it made no difference.
For a classic probability problem that many people get wrong: the Monty Hall problem.
Who says blatant hypocrisy doesn't pay?
Turns out they changed the question to the one on the ballot paper.
We still have no idea what's going on.
This poll is a big move - yet Betfair has only gone from around 5.2 (last night) to 4.7 now.
Of course it's only one poll and I think the Crosby article is a bit more positive for Remain than the headline poll numbers.
In particular the Wisdom Index is still very heavily expecting a Remain win - and history suggests the Wisdom Index is usually a good pointer - it's not normally wrong in a big way.
Suspect conclusion may therefore be that Wisdom Index is pointing to an expectation that some people will bottle it at the last minute - ie in order to win, Leave needs to actually be about 3% ahead on the night before voting day.
So if you want to hurl insults at me, feel free.
Anecdote alert - got talking to someone yesterday ranting and raving about immigration destroying the fabric of this country and planning on voting remain as the lesser of two evils! Think I managed to persuade him to back leave at the end of our conversation, although I stressed the unfairness of favouring unskilled EU immigrants over highly skilled non-EU migrants - my miniscule contribution to the leave campaign!
ICM’s final “wisdom of crowds index” – respondents’ averaged best guess of how each party will score – continues to put the Tories ahead on 35%, compared to 32% Labour. Voters also envisage the Lib Dems on 14%, ahead of Ukip on 10%, all figures that are unchanged from the provisional data.
While the Tory/Lab figures look reasonable, the LD/UKIP ones are horrendous.
6% swing from left to right at the real election.
Between now and the end of voting day that will either rise to 100% or fall to 0%. Between now and then, it will rise and fall - the whole point of this site is surely to determine whether the betting markets are correctly judging where it lies at any given moment, and taking advantage if they do not.
The fact that this is one-shot means that, unlike say a roulette wheel, we'll never know what the true probability "really was" at any given point in the campaign, but it's entirely possible that it's currently below 33% but above 20%. If it rises to 100% on June 24th, people who claimed it was more like 60% will say they were "right". If it falls to 0%, people who claimed 20% was a fair price will say they were "right".
Of course it's entirely possible to be correct that the probability of something happening is 20%, but for that thing to happen. Doesn't make your assessment of the probability as 20% wrong, ex post.