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One of the less attractive aspects of British Euroscepticism (a keenly-contested category) is the willingness of many supporters to see the imminent collapse of the EU with every electoral development around the continent. Last year, Eurosceptics were salivating at the prospect of Geert Wilders’ party topping the poll in the Dutch election. Thwarted on that front, nearly nine out of ten Leave cats who expressed a preference decided that Marine Le Pen’s election as French president would be best for Britain. But the French electorate stubbornly refused to go off the reservation.
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Despite the name it is not a Welsh language party and the name was deliberately chosen to be recognisable to English speakers (think National Anthem) - if someone is not happy voting for a party with a Welsh name it probably wouldnt vote for it whatever the name....
It's target audience is not just former Plaid voters or supporters of movements like Yes Cymru - but also the many people in Wales who are fed up with traditional politics and want something different.
Neither is the party a Plaid splinter group - rather we are trying to build a wider national alliance more like SNP
The party is already organising and in the process of submitting Electoral Commission registration, and expects to be officially launched in a few weeks time. Watch this space
Maybe the EU is focusing on its original foundations, with the exception of Italy and those most committed to Eurozone membership
Superficially attractive on the outside but in reality they have people who annoy good people.
Dele Alli is just like Jean-Claude Juncker.
Though of course with Plaid still nowhere near becoming the largest party in Wales in either Assembly or Westminster elections, Wales having voted Leave in the EU referendum like the rest of the UK and its economy tightly linked to England there is virtually zero demand for Welsh independence in the principality anyway
Barbs aside, an interesting article. I remain slightly surprised that enlargement is back on the agenda, given some of the internal frictions.
OT, this current predilection for creating new political parties puts me in mind of this;
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2018/03/07/whoever-governs-italy-will-destroy-euro-within/
The seeming answer would be to massively beef up the European Parliament. However, despite the wet dreams of bureaucratic buffoons you cannot simply wish away centuries of culture and identity. Not only that, freedom of action, to diverge or converge, is necessary for the flexibility required by the member states as their sizes, economies, cultures and demographics differ. Leaving aside that there is no European demos, the Parliament becoming powerful would simply lead to imposition of unwanted laws upon smaller nations that lack the representation to mount a parliamentary resistance.
It's almost as if trying to integrate 27/28 countries into a new country by stealth, deception, and bureaucratic trickery is a bloody stupid idea.
Hiw many expressed a preference? One?
Its thinking underpinned by an old French guy, who should long ago have been abndoned to the history books.
If Brexit goes ahead the likelihood is that it'll be the collapse of the pound that'll bring us back and next time they'll demand we rejoin as full members and that'll include the Euro.
Secondly, as Alastair points out, the EU is pretty much immune to sturm und drang within individual countries. Brexit is, as we can all see, extremely challenging in execution. A eurozone member, even one with Italy's economic clout, would find it even more difficult.
Thirdly, from our purely selfish national interests, we would prefer the EU to prosper; some one has to buy (say) our genuine Cornish Pasties.
There are some tricky waters for them to navigate; the proposed linking of economic aid to support for EU migrant policies is not sitting well with the Visegrad group, and Austria is likely to align with them on this issue.
Based on the Commission's own reports, completing EMU and drawing other countries within the Eurozone is also likely to cause problems, even within the core group - Germany is singularly reluctant to shoulder its obligations.
So, the pound is bound to be safe.
There's the American "Our Country, 'Tis of Thee", of course, but that's not an anthem and a long way from Wales.
"How?"
A look of incomprehension.
"We should only 52% leave?" I asked.
"Yes."
"So if Remain had won 52 - 48, then we should 48% leave?"
"No, we stay."
I understand his pain, but as the EU always assures us, we can't be half in and half out, even though that is the Labour position.
Hungary to EU: "You didn't"
https://www.politico.eu/article/hungary-blasts-commissions-double-standards-on-martin-selmayr/
https://twitter.com/JohnRentoul/status/971674374938951680
https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/datasets/employmentbyindustryemp13
I noticed that employment in the agricultural sector has increased by 30% from 2005 to 2017.
Which is curious because output in the agricultural sector was the same in those two years:
https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/grossdomesticproductgdp/timeseries/l2kl/pn2
Yet we're told by the NFU and Guardian that there is a 'labour shortage' among agricultural workers and we need to have indentured labours from the third world to stop the countryside from becoming a wasteland of unharvested crops.
I do hope no PBers have fallen for this pandering to exploitative and inefficient farmers.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/oct/25/nobody-calls-it-czechia-czech-republic-new-fails-catch-on
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/brexit/2018/03/08/how-the-economics-profession-got-it-wrong-on-brexit/
I have no doubt that the new Italian government will be a thorn in the side of the EU with it's vow to disregard hundreds of EU regulations and question it's overall contributions.
Time will tell but they are not going to be bowing at the Court of Monsieur Juncker
Your second paragraph is also wrong as if joining the Euro had been a requirement of joining the EU it would have been about 70% Leave and a Leave landslide
I voted Leave, but I'm genuinely puzzled by the kind of sentiments you're expressing (while recollecting that you voted Remain). The EU is what it is. The rules are all written down. Some countries are better at following the rules than others (e.g. Germany is the #1 for ignoring directives), but its a rules-based institution, which is both a strength and a source of frustration.
Italy had one weapon for restoring its international competitiveness (devaluation). Once that weapon was put beyond use in '99, it's been unable to find another.
'Land of my Fathers', 'Ar hyd y nos'.
Still voted leave though.
No way will the SPD vote for coalition with the CDU.
https://twitter.com/BBCGaryR/status/971628026516688896
Young men. Probably from Mansfield!!
And a reminder that, head on, the Williams and Sauber look really similar. I think the Sauber has a pale rear wing, the Williams a dark one. Expecting much confusion over the season given the similarity.
Having said that, it is based on (probably valid) critiques of models, and has little to say about particular sectors (finance; automotive; aerospace; pharmaceutical etc) which face significant threats in the absence of a decent deal with the EU.
(It also has nothing to say about the costs/benefits of being in or out of the single market should a significant trade war break out.)
Intrigued to see how Sauber do. Could well exceed (low) expectations.
Mind you, I do get a whiff of nostalgia from the suggestion that those not in favour of the EU are therefore in favour of (or at least not very concerned by) the prospect of a massive war.
The Brexit debate has been distorted by several myths. One of the most persistent and widely repeated is that the economic performance of the UK improved after joining the EEC in 1973. This claim was made by the OECD and was regularly stated in the media during the Brexit referendum campaign.
Personally, I wish the EU well. Their somewhat belated return to growth has undoubtedly helped us to reduce our trade gap, increase production and grow faster than forecast. Long may that continue.
I think Alastair is wrong to describe the UK as hostile. I really don't believe it is. If the peoples of Europe really think that a European State which controls their budgets, their taxes and their priorities along with their currency and interest rates is better than the alternatives good luck to them. I just don't believe that there will ever be a majority in the UK for that option. @WilliamGlenn and a few others are openly and candidly for it. But most remainers continue to delude themselves that all of the price that had to be paid was in leaving when in fact the price of staying was unacceptable.
BREXIT has undermined support for the SNP rather than boosting backing for independence and made life harder for Nicola Sturgeon, the country’s leading pollster has said.
Professor Sir John Curtice said the SNP’s opposition to Brexit had alienated many Leave voters who had previously supported the party, and cost it dearly in votes.
Around a third of people who voted SNP in the 2016 Holyrood election went on to vote for Brexit a few weeks later, and many of those never returned to the SNP
http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/16072971.Curtice__Brexit_has_made_life_tougher_for_Sturgeon_and_SNP/?ref=twtrec
The EU might fail - certainly, they need to replace their tin ear. But I don't think it's inevitable, or desirable from a world or even a UK point of view.
Once we've left, we should wish bid them farewell and good luck, just as I hope they'd do to us. We need to be friendly neighbours.
But too many leavers seem to take Farage's perspective and want the EU destroyed. This is bad, from our and their perspectives.
If you believe the EU can last either indefinitely or, more credibly, for a very prolonged period (centuries) then that isn't the case. But, for reasons I outlined above (maybe last thread?) I do think the EU will crumble.
I am not as sanguine as the authors appear to be about the risks of leaving, but the critiques they present are sensible ones.
I think your comment just highlights how many practical barriers there are to a true implosion of the EU.
I think you're being a bit of a silly sausage with your timescales. It's perfectly possible the United Kingdom won't exist for a prolonged period, or even centuries. Does that mean we should tear it down now?
I've never been much of a fan of Farage but to be fair he has never disguised the fact he'd like to see the EU and Euro implode and let all the "States" of the EU go back to being independent trading nations again like there were in the days of the Common Market.
The nature of contemporary and future technology and industry makes that impossible. See JC's example of the Mini going back and forward to France to have the cam angle sensor (or whatever the fuck it was) fitted. Enterprises, industry and technology is now transnational and therefore so must be the economic and political framework in which they operate.
For that reason I suspect the only way this thing "implodes" will be through war and bloodshed rather than a peaceful, democratic end like the British performed through our referendum.
We should hope for everyone's sake's that doesn't happen.
But in any event my prediction was that Brexit would make life more difficult for the SNP for exactly the reasons that Curtice has identified.
People in the North keep Irish and thus EU citizenship post Brexit - and the U.K. Subsidy and NHS. A united Ireland is popular in theory - but then you look at what both sides of the border have to lose.
https://twitter.com/Roadwarrior29/status/970244963664572416
But with the BBC reporting that there are so many things the government should be doing to boost our growth regardless of Brexit, with academics pointing out that the economic effects of Brexit are vastly overstated and with the SNP falling back as predicted I am in danger of bursting with smugness this morning and am off to do some real work!