On “negotiation” - wouldn’t surprise me if Johnson hasn’t read the WA, let alone understood it. Then rocks up in Brussels with a list of “demands” only to have it patiently pointed out to him how each and every one is satisfied by the existing agreement.
As will it be patiently pointed out to him what is involved in a no deal and, as with May, he will resile his no dealism.
If house prices really do drop 8% next year and 5 year after then the Tories are finished. It is 1990s negative equity redux.
Didn't stop them winning in 1992.
And to add to this, you need to consider regional variations. If a national 8% fall in house prices is driven primarily by falls in London, I don't see how that damages the Tories all that much.
Is this one of those cases where the median house price could remain nominally flat but the "average" drops 8% as superheated London falls away ? I think divergence to that scale would be... unlikely but could be something like that. (-1% change outwith London -2% mean /-4% London for instance)
Cambridge has a 4% yoy fall, too. Though for much the same reasons.
No doubt the usual economic geniuses on the Leave side will be dismissing this serious and credible forecast as "project fear". Just looking at the forecast impact on the government finances, the cost of a hard Brexit is around £30bn a year, or about £550-600mn a week. Put that on your fucking bus.
The only way such figures will be believed by Leavers is if they actually experience them - and no doubt in that event there will be other factors found to blame.
'I'm not entirely convinced that we have blown off our own feet, but if we have it's because we used the incorrect ammunition which was probably supplied by Guy Verhofstadt.'
As a Green who has engaged with the internal conversation about potential deal with the LDs; it isn't going to happen. We don't trust them on policy, nor politics. It has happened in the past that we made agreements with them not to stand and they agreed, we stood down, and they stood anyway. Whilst Sian and Jonathan seem to be in favour, I would say 2/3rds of the membership are against.
So a deal that could give the Greens 6+ seats does not appeal? Clearly there are policy differences but all we are talking about are arrangements in maybe 30-50 seats.
Don't game FPTP and stay pure seems to be your approach.
I agree with you; the rest of the membership not so much. I think it is because we have lots of anti austerity ex Lab and ex LD voters who just do not trust the LD party on anything, either because of past relationships with the LD party turning sour or because they do not trust the word of LDHQ.
The problem for the Greens is that on 8% they will struggle to win extra seats under FPTP even if the LDs stand down. For example, the Greens got 17% of the vote in Isle of Wight. If you add the LDs 4% then that still only takes you to 21%, around 3k votes behind Labour and 24k behind the Tories.
Realistically the Greens best shot of picking up extra seats would be to take on Lab in Bristol W and Norwich S but the LDs would presumably also see these as targets. It shows that while there is a certain level of cooperation, the Greens and LDs are also competitors fishing in the same pool of voters.
Yeah, pretty much all of this. Whilst LDs and Greens have the same pool of voters, the ideology behind the parties is wildly different. It means on the surface people say we should work together and we'd have vote transfers etc. but lots of LDs are just wet remainers who want to go back to Cameron and Blair days, whereas lots of Greens (like myself) could easily be to the left of a lot of Corbyn's project and mostly disagree with Lab on environmental policy.
The latest YouGov poll for The Times shows we are still very much in four-way split territory.
As ever, look at the trend not the snapshot: The Tories are back up to 25 per cent, the highest since mid-May, while the Brexit Party are down to 19 per cent, the lowest since mid-May, leaving the Lib Dems and Labour to battle it out for second, a fight which the latter is currently winning. The Greens are back down to 8 per cent - which is where they were in, you guessed it, mid-May.
It suggests that some of the dramatic changes seen since the European elections at the end of May, particularly on the right, may have been reversed. Although the chart above shows how volatile things can be.
This is all MoE territory. The big four, think about that for a start looking back just six months, all hovering about 22% give or take a few points and largely seen through the BREXIT prism.
The fluidity of our politics is a sight not seen since the early 1920's and frankly it's the most volatile I've ever known.
On B&R by-election I was chatting with a well placed Tory yesterday evening and they've already written off the seat completely and are preparing their excuses for the inevitable bad headlines of Boris enjoying the shortest political honeymoon ever.
All will be blamed on continuing BREXIT uncertainty that Boris hasn't had time to fix, typical mid term blues and understandable misgivings over the candidate.
“On B&R by-election I was chatting with a well placed Tory yesterday evening and they've already written off the seat completely.”
Hmmm... so Shadsy’s 1/6 on LD victory at B&R is money in the bank?
On current polls the LDs should win Brecon about 38% to 32% for the Tories, however based on the Comres Boris bounce poll it would be 39% each
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
No doubt the usual economic geniuses on the Leave side will be dismissing this serious and credible forecast as "project fear". Just looking at the forecast impact on the government finances, the cost of a hard Brexit is around £30bn a year, or about £550-600mn a week. Put that on your fucking bus.
As economic forecasts have been so accurate so far since the Brexit vote!
A 'clean break' Brexit will save us at least £24 billion a year and up to £50 billion a year on this article
At the moment if we get a 2019 general election it will be because the government loses a VONC most likely.
At the moment given Boris' commitment to Leave on October 31st Deal or No Deal, including proroguing Parliament at the end of October for a November Queen's Speech to ensure Brexit on October 31st it is hard to see that not leading to a VONC beforehand with Grieve, Lee etc joining the opposition beforehand to back a VONC vote and likely forcing a general election or else a general election in November.
The only way we get a 2020 general election is likely if the Withdrawal Agreement has passed by October 31st with enough Labour MPs voting for it to outweigh the ERG and thus we then enter the transition period. However hard to see that happening or Boris even putting forward the Withdrawal Agreement to the Commons again at the moment given his opposition to the backstop as stands and his desire to replace it with a technical solution
Just picking myself up off the floor. I think it's the first time I've agreed with you on anything.
The latest YouGov poll for The Times shows we are still very much in four-way split territory.
As ever, look at the trend not the snapshot: The Tories are back up to 25 per cent, the highest since mid-May, while the Brexit Party are down to 19 per cent, the lowest since mid-May, leaving the Lib Dems and Labour to battle it out for second, a fight which the latter is currently winning. The Greens are back down to 8 per cent - which is where they were in, you guessed it, mid-May.
It suggests that some of the dramatic changes seen since the European elections at the end of May, particularly on the right, may have been reversed. Although the chart above shows how volatile things can be.
This is all MoE territory. The big four, think about that for a start looking back just six months, all hovering about 22% give or take a few points and largely seen through the BREXIT prism.
The fluidity of our politics is a sight not seen since the early 1920's and frankly it's the most volatile I've ever known.
On B&R by-election I was chatting with a well placed Tory yesterday evening and they've already written off the seat completely and are preparing their excuses for the inevitable bad headlines of Boris enjoying the shortest political honeymoon ever.
All will be blamed on continuing BREXIT uncertainty that Boris hasn't had time to fix, typical mid term blues and understandable misgivings over the candidate.
“On B&R by-election I was chatting with a well placed Tory yesterday evening and they've already written off the seat completely.”
Hmmm... so Shadsy’s 1/6 on LD victory at B&R is money in the bank?
It would appear so. @shadsy not exactly known for offering generous odds on heavy favourites. Indeed why should he?
Nor am I unduly surprised by the Tory assessment. Realistic, pragmatic and with reasonably arguable excuses well in hand.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
It depends on the costs and benefits.
I'm not an ideological no dealer, I would prefer a deal if possible. I am an ideological democrat though and to me the backstop is unconscionable. This isn't about cost/benefits, one is simply a deal-breaker.
It takes two to tango though. Clearly the Irish view certain things as a deal-breaker of their own, and have made that abundantly clear. Why is it unreasonable for us to do the same?
As a Green who has engaged with the internal conversation about potential deal with the LDs; it isn't going to happen. We don't trust them on policy, nor politics. It has happened in the past that we made agreements with them not to stand and they agreed, we stood down, and they stood anyway. Whilst Sian and Jonathan seem to be in favour, I would say 2/3rds of the membership are against.
The Green Party and the LibDems seem to agree on a lot of environmental policies - a lot more than with any of the other parties anyway. Also on Brexit and proportional representation. It makes sense for the two parties to co-operate to get as much of that agenda as possible. A large block of LibDem, Green, SNP MPs may be able to extract some of what they want from Labour (if they're the largest party). If PR can be achieved then there's no more need to co-operate. If you really don't want to co-operate then be prepared for a Tory/Brexit government where you get nothing.
I don't think electoral pacts work all that well in practice. Voters are not chess pieces, and it seems to me that the political outlook of a Green voter in Brighton is going to be very different to the outlook of a Lib Dem voter in Winchester.
Oh dear! This is where populism/nationalism leads. Disgraceful
I cannot imagine why Nigel Farage likes and admire Donald Trump.
Farage supported Trump long before Boris, Farage of course famously addressed a Trump rally in Mississippi in summer 2016 when Trump was still trailing Hillary in most state and national polls.
Boris has never been a Trump fanboy like Farage (or Piers Morgan), he even criticised Trump when Mayor but Trump also respects his position as POTUS and wants a productive relationship with Trump
As a Green who has engaged with the internal conversation about potential deal with the LDs; it isn't going to happen. We don't trust them on policy, nor politics. It has happened in the past that we made agreements with them not to stand and they agreed, we stood down, and they stood anyway. Whilst Sian and Jonathan seem to be in favour, I would say 2/3rds of the membership are against.
So a deal that could give the Greens 6+ seats does not appeal? Clearly there are policy differences but all we are talking about are arrangements in maybe 30-50 seats.
Don't game FPTP and stay pure seems to be your approach.
I agree with you; the rest of the membership not so much. I think it is because we have lots of anti austerity ex Lab and ex LD voters who just do not trust the LD party on anything, either because of past relationships with the LD party turning sour or because they do not trust the word of LDHQ.
The problem for the Greens is that on 8% they will struggle to win extra seats under FPTP even if the LDs stand down. For example, the Greens got 17% of the vote in Isle of Wight. If you add the LDs 4% then that still only takes you to 21%, around 3k votes behind Labour and 24k behind the Tories.
Realistically the Greens best shot of picking up extra seats would be to take on Lab in Bristol W and Norwich S but the LDs would presumably also see these as targets. It shows that while there is a certain level of cooperation, the Greens and LDs are also competitors fishing in the same pool of voters.
Yeah, pretty much all of this. Whilst LDs and Greens have the same pool of voters, the ideology behind the parties is wildly different. It means on the surface people say we should work together and we'd have vote transfers etc. but lots of LDs are just wet remainers who want to go back to Cameron and Blair days, whereas lots of Greens (like myself) could easily be to the left of a lot of Corbyn's project and mostly disagree with Lab on environmental policy.
I think another difference is that the LDs have become more of an establishment party while the Greens are outsiders.
Unless Scotland (or NI or Wales??) go for UDI, that seems unlikely. That is, of course, unless Brown expects Boris to be PM for a considerable amount of time.
Why is Scottish independence contingent upon PM Johnson being in office for a considerable amount of time?
In what way is the Union safer under PM Corbyn, PM Farage, PM McDonnell or PM Other?
Someone should offer Sturgeon the job. It would solve a lot of issues
PM Sturgeon’s Queen’s speech: the Act of Dissolution 2020.
England gets to have William and Scotland gets King Harry, who will become the northern monarch before his southern big brother (hopefully).
That we can do without. Lizzie maybe but we don't need the freeloaders.
It was the Norwegian settlement, after their successful independence referendum in 1905. They took the younger of the Danish princes as their monarch. His big brother only became monarch in Copenhagen long after his wee brother had been installed on the new throne in Oslo.
Harry strikes me as being more suited to the Scots than the über-English William.
As every English rugby supporter will tell you Prince William is not über-English. This is him celebrating Wales beating England in the World Cup.
Prince William is the next Prince of Wales and knows he will be King of Scotland, Canada and Australia and New Zealand too as it stands not just King of England.
He therefore can afford to let Harry favour England, while he is more flexible in his support
“while he is more flexible in his support”: exactly what I just said! William is über-English. ”Fexibility” of loyalty is the English to a tee.
The royal family is as much Scottish (through the Queen Mother and having Mary Queen of Scots as an ancestor) as English
The latest YouGov poll for The Times shows we are still very much in four-way split territory.
As ever, look at the trend not the snapshot: The Tories are back up to 25 per cent, the highest since mid-May, while the Brexit Party are down to 19 per cent, the lowest since mid-May, leaving the Lib Dems and Labour to battle it out for second, a fight which the latter is currently winning. The Greens are back down to 8 per cent - which is where they were in, you guessed it, mid-May.
It suggests that some of the dramatic changes seen since the European elections at the end of May, particularly on the right, may have been reversed. Although the chart above shows how volatile things can be.
This is all MoE territory. The big four, think about that for a start looking back just six months, all hovering about 22% give or take a few points and largely seen through the BREXIT prism.
The fluidity of our politics is a sight not seen since the early 1920's and frankly it's the most volatile I've ever known.
On B&R by-election I was chatting with a well placed Tory yesterday evening and they've already written off the seat completely and are preparing their excuses for the inevitable bad headlines of Boris enjoying the shortest political honeymoon ever.
All will be blamed on continuing BREXIT uncertainty that Boris hasn't had time to fix, typical mid term blues and understandable misgivings over the candidate.
“On B&R by-election I was chatting with a well placed Tory yesterday evening and they've already written off the seat completely.”
Hmmm... so Shadsy’s 1/6 on LD victory at B&R is money in the bank?
It would appear so. @shadsy not exactly known for offering generous odds on heavy favourites. Indeed why should he?
Nor am I unduly surprised by the Tory assessment. Realistic, pragmatic and with reasonably arguable excuses well in hand.
True but also with a huge morale boost for Boris and the Tories if the Tories get a shock hold or even get the LDs close after a Boris poll bounce
As a Green who has engaged with the internal conversation about potential deal with the LDs; it isn't going to happen. We don't trust them on policy, nor politics. It has happened in the past that we made agreements with them not to stand and they agreed, we stood down, and they stood anyway. Whilst Sian and Jonathan seem to be in favour, I would say 2/3rds of the membership are against.
So a deal that could give the Greens 6+ seats does not appeal? Clearly there are policy differences but all we are talking about are arrangements in maybe 30-50 seats.
Don't game FPTP and stay pure seems to be your approach.
I agree with you; the rest of the membership not so much. I think it is because we have lots of anti austerity ex Lab and ex LD voters who just do not trust the LD party on anything, either because of past relationships with the LD party turning sour or because they do not trust the word of LDHQ.
The problem for the Greens is that on 8% they will struggle to win extra seats under FPTP even if the LDs stand down. For example, the Greens got 17% of the vote in Isle of Wight. If you add the LDs 4% then that still only takes you to 21%, around 3k votes behind Labour and 24k behind the Tories.
Realistically the Greens best shot of picking up extra seats would be to take on Lab in Bristol W and Norwich S but the LDs would presumably also see these as targets. It shows that while there is a certain level of cooperation, the Greens and LDs are also competitors fishing in the same pool of voters.
Yeah, pretty much all of this. Whilst LDs and Greens have the same pool of voters, the ideology behind the parties is wildly different. It means on the surface people say we should work together and we'd have vote transfers etc. but lots of LDs are just wet remainers who want to go back to Cameron and Blair days, whereas lots of Greens (like myself) could easily be to the left of a lot of Corbyn's project and mostly disagree with Lab on environmental policy.
I think another difference is that the LDs have become more of an establishment party while the Greens are outsiders.
Oh dear! This is where populism/nationalism leads. Disgraceful
I cannot imagine why Nigel Farage likes and admire Donald Trump.
Farage supported Trump long before Boris, Farage of course famously addressed a Trump rally in Mississippi in summer 2016 when Trump was still trailing Hillary in most state and national polls.
Boris has never been a Trump fanboy like Farage (or Piers Morgan), he even criticised Trump when Mayor but Trump also respects his position as POTUS and wants a productive relationship with Trump
Or Boris also respects his position as POTUS and wants a productive relationship with Trump I should say
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
It depends on the costs and benefits.
I'm not an ideological no dealer, I would prefer a deal if possible. I am an ideological democrat though and to me the backstop is unconscionable. This isn't about cost/benefits, one is simply a deal-breaker.
It takes two to tango though. Clearly the Irish view certain things as a deal-breaker of their own, and have made that abundantly clear. Why is it unreasonable for us to do the same?
I'll try again. The backstop did not come out of thin air or some evil machinations of the EU. It was first presented as a way of having no hard border between the SM and the UK on the island of Ireland. If you are to have completely uninhibited transmission of goods you must have the same rules on both sides. May agreed to this but the DUP didn't because it put Ulster into a different position from rUK and might be thought a step towards Irish unity. Having been reminded where her majority came from Mrs May accepted that and proposed that the backstop apply not only to Ulster but to the whole of the UK.
The question for us going forward is do we want to effectively remain in the SM? If we do then the backstop is an extremely generous way of achieving this because it gives us access that other countries have to pay for. The price is regulatory alignment. I can live with that not least because we still have the option of ending regulatory alignment at any point if the EU did something more than normally stupid at the cost of leaving the SM at that point. If we want that "freedom" now we need a FTA which is going to be both complex and take a long time to put in place.
The deal gives us both options and time to think about them. It really is a no brainer that should be supported by everyone except those absolutely determined not to leave under any circumstances and those who live somewhere other than planet earth.
As a Green who has engaged with the internal conversation about potential deal with the LDs; it isn't going to happen. We don't trust them on policy, nor politics. It has happened in the past that we made agreements with them not to stand and they agreed, we stood down, and they stood anyway. Whilst Sian and Jonathan seem to be in favour, I would say 2/3rds of the membership are against.
So a deal that could give the Greens 6+ seats does not appeal? Clearly there are policy differences but all we are talking about are arrangements in maybe 30-50 seats.
Don't game FPTP and stay pure seems to be your approach.
I agree with you; the rest of the membership not so much. I think it is because we have lots of anti austerity ex Lab and ex LD voters who just do not trust the LD party on anything, either because of past relationships with the LD party turning sour or because they do not trust the word of LDHQ.
That was then this is now. But Greens were very happy to let the LDs stand aside and even in some places run their election campaigns at the 2019 locals. LD activists producing Green leaflets and then helping deliver them.
Oh dear! This is where populism/nationalism leads. Disgraceful
I cannot imagine why Nigel Farage likes and admire Donald Trump.
Farage supported Trump long before Boris, Farage of course famously addressed a Trump rally in Mississippi in summer 2016 when Trump was still trailing Hillary in most state and national polls.
Boris has never been a Trump fanboy like Farage (or Piers Morgan), he even criticised Trump when Mayor but Trump also respects his position as POTUS and wants a productive relationship with Trump
Or Boris also respects his position as POTUS and wants a productive relationship with him I should say
True, he does have something of the poodle about him. I'm sure a bit of casual racism won't put him off.
As far as the LDs and Greens working together, not much to fight over here in East Ham if I'm being honest and I doubt Stephen Timms, clinging on by his fingertips to his 40,000 majority, will be losing a lot of sleep.
If there are local arrangements, there are local arrangements. I don't think there should be a national electoral pact. The same will be true of TBP and the Conservatives - I can imagine the TBP not wishing to contest some Conservative seats and very much wishing to contest others.
Of course, despite the calls for a purge of the unfaithful, it may be some Conservative associations choose not to deselect a sitting Conservative MP who takes a very different view to his or her leader on leaving the EU. I'm sure TBP will be only too happy to contest those seats - it may of course be other parties will choose not to oppose an anti-Boris Conservative.
Just a thought on sales - if the population increases, it's likely the volume of sales will increase as well before every new person needs "things" which they have to buy. Rather like some of the other economic data trumpeted by one or two individuals, all it tells you is there are more people and people are cheap so firms hire people rather than seek to improve business efficiencies or productivity so productivity remains depressed but that doesn't matter as there are always more people willing and able to work.
By the way, that also explains the cap on wage increases but it doesn't tell you about growing skills shortages in key specialisms and professions. The Johnson future seems to be about the British worker washing the car, cleaning the house or poring coffee for some billionaire from somewhere in the world. Possibly not as attractive as it sounds (except for the billionaire of course).
No doubt the usual economic geniuses on the Leave side will be dismissing this serious and credible forecast as "project fear". Just looking at the forecast impact on the government finances, the cost of a hard Brexit is around £30bn a year, or about £550-600mn a week. Put that on your fucking bus.
As economic forecasts have been so accurate so far since the Brexit vote!
A 'clean break' Brexit will save us at least £24 billion a year and up to £50 billion a year on this article
Plus I see even the OBR forecasts a No Deal recession would be over by 2021
The Bank of England's forecast of the level of GDP (the single most important economic number) post Brexit is quite accurate. In q1 2019 GDP was up 4.8% since q2 2016. Pre Brexit the Bank forecast it would be 6.6% higher, post Brexit it cut the forecast to 4.0%. So which forecast is more accurate? (will be even closer to post Brexit forecast in q2 if growth is 0 or slightly negative as expected).
Also, of course OBR forecasts that the recession ends. Recessions are always temporary and cyclical. The point is that GDP is permanently lower, meaning we are all poorer on average, and the government has less money net, even taking into account net EU contributions.
Oh dear! This is where populism/nationalism leads. Disgraceful
I cannot imagine why Nigel Farage likes and admire Donald Trump.
Farage supported Trump long before Boris, Farage of course famously addressed a Trump rally in Mississippi in summer 2016 when Trump was still trailing Hillary in most state and national polls.
Boris has never been a Trump fanboy like Farage (or Piers Morgan), he even criticised Trump when Mayor but Trump also respects his position as POTUS and wants a productive relationship with Trump
Or Boris also respects his position as POTUS and wants a productive relationship with him I should say
True, he does have something of the poodle about him. I'm sure a bit of casual racism won't put him off.
I think this is to a certain extent a red herring (or kipper) relating it specifically to Boris. Anyone, The Great Jezziah (the real one) aside, will struggle to negotiate Trump as POTUS. They are the 600lb gorilla and we are about to cast ourselves adrift from the 600lb shark. So we need to tread carefully geopolitically and, sadly, can't repel every one of our potential future trading partners.
One of the many benefits of having voted to leave the EU.
The latest YouGov poll for The Times shows we are still very much in four-way split territory.
As ever, look at the trend not the snapshot: The Tories are back up to 25 per cent, the highest since mid-May, while the Brexit Party are down to 19 per cent, the lowest since mid-May, leaving the Lib Dems and Labour to battle it out for second, a fight which the latter is currently winning. The Greens are back down to 8 per cent - which is where they were in, you guessed it, mid-May.
It suggests that some of the dramatic changes seen since the European elections at the end of May, particularly on the right, may have been reversed. Although the chart above shows how volatile things can be.
This is all MoE territory. The big four, think about that for a start looking back just six months, all hovering about 22% give or take a few points and largely seen through the BREXIT prism.
The fluidity of our politics is a sight not seen since the early 1920's and frankly it's the most volatile I've ever known.
On B&R by-election I was chatting with a well placed Tory yesterday evening and they've already written off the seat completely and are preparing their excuses for the inevitable bad headlines of Boris enjoying the shortest political honeymoon ever.
All will be blamed on continuing BREXIT uncertainty that Boris hasn't had time to fix, typical mid term blues and understandable misgivings over the candidate.
“On B&R by-election I was chatting with a well placed Tory yesterday evening and they've already written off the seat completely.”
Hmmm... so Shadsy’s 1/6 on LD victory at B&R is money in the bank?
It would appear so. @shadsy not exactly known for offering generous odds on heavy favourites. Indeed why should he?
Nor am I unduly surprised by the Tory assessment. Realistic, pragmatic and with reasonably arguable excuses well in hand.
True but also with a huge morale boost for Boris and the Tories if the Tories get a shock hold or even get the LDs close after a Boris poll bounce
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
It depends on the costs and benefits.
I'm not an ideological no dealer, I would prefer a deal if possible. I am an ideological democrat though and to me the backstop is unconscionable. This isn't about cost/benefits, one is simply a deal-breaker.
It takes two to tango though. Clearly the Irish view certain things as a deal-breaker of their own, and have made that abundantly clear. Why is it unreasonable for us to do the same?
I'll try again. The backstop did not come out of thin air or some evil machinations of the EU. It was first presented as a way of having no hard border between the SM and the UK on the island of Ireland. If you are to have completely uninhibited transmission of goods you must have the same rules on both sides. May agreed to this but the DUP didn't because it put Ulster into a different position from rUK and might be thought a step towards Irish unity. Having been reminded where her majority came from Mrs May accepted that and proposed that the backstop apply not only to Ulster but to the whole of the UK.
The question for us going forward is do we want to effectively remain in the SM? If we do then the backstop is an extremely generous way of achieving this because it gives us access that other countries have to pay for. The price is regulatory alignment. I can live with that not least because we still have the option of ending regulatory alignment at any point if the EU did something more than normally stupid at the cost of leaving the SM at that point. If we want that "freedom" now we need a FTA which is going to be both complex and take a long time to put in place.
The deal gives us both options and time to think about them. It really is a no brainer that should be supported by everyone except those absolutely determined not to leave under any circumstances and those who live somewhere other than planet earth.
Absolutely - and the point about the backstop applying across the nation is that it is simply inconceivable that we could be forced to remain in it against our will for any significant amount of time (which appears to be Philip's principal objection), whatever the theoretical niceties of international law.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
The latest YouGov poll for The Times shows we are still very much in four-way split territory.
As ever, look at the trend not the snapshot: The Tories are back up to 25 per cent, the highest since mid-May, while the Brexit Party are down to 19 per cent, the lowest since mid-May, leaving the Lib Dems and Labour to battle it out for second, a fight which the latter is currently winning. The Greens are back down to 8 per cent - which is where they were in, you guessed it, mid-May.
It suggests that some of the dramatic changes seen since the European elections at the end of May, particularly on the right, may have been reversed. Although the chart above shows how volatile things can be.
This is all MoE territory. The big four, think about that for a start looking back just six months, all hovering about 22% give or take a few points and largely seen through the BREXIT prism.
The fluidity of our politics is a sight not seen since the early 1920's and frankly it's the most volatile I've ever known.
On B&R by-election I was chatting with a well placed Tory yesterday evening and they've already written off the seat completely and are preparing their excuses for the inevitable bad headlines of Boris enjoying the shortest political honeymoon ever.
All will be blamed on continuing BREXIT uncertainty that Boris hasn't had time to fix, typical mid term blues and understandable misgivings over the candidate.
“On B&R by-election I was chatting with a well placed Tory yesterday evening and they've already written off the seat completely.”
Hmmm... so Shadsy’s 1/6 on LD victory at B&R is money in the bank?
On current polls the LDs should win Brecon about 38% to 32% for the Tories, however based on the Comres Boris bounce poll it would be 39% each
As a Green who has engaged with the internal conversation about potential deal with the LDs; it isn't going to happen. We don't trust them on policy, nor politics. It has happened in the past that we made agreements with them not to stand and they agreed, we stood down, and they stood anyway. Whilst Sian and Jonathan seem to be in favour, I would say 2/3rds of the membership are against.
The Green Party and the LibDems seem to agree on a lot of environmental policies - a lot more than with any of the other parties anyway. Also on Brexit and proportional representation. It makes sense for the two parties to co-operate to get as much of that agenda as possible. A large block of LibDem, Green, SNP MPs may be able to extract some of what they want from Labour (if they're the largest party). If PR can be achieved then there's no more need to co-operate. If you really don't want to co-operate then be prepared for a Tory/Brexit government where you get nothing.
I don't think electoral pacts work all that well in practice. Voters are not chess pieces, and it seems to me that the political outlook of a Green voter in Brighton is going to be very different to the outlook of a Lib Dem voter in Winchester.
There hasnt been much testing in practice in the UK so we dont really know.
I voted green at the euros, but would be unlikely to at a GE without a pact with the LDs, partly as the vote is more wasted in FPTP but also because both parties can realistically only deliver by working with other parties. If they can't bring themselves to do that in a time of national crisis, what on earth is the point?
A cocoon for members to congratulate each other for being right whilst refusing to talk to the nation is never going to be attractive to enough people to create change. Minor parties have to be outward looking and willing to work with those they disagree with.
I'll try again. The backstop did not come out of thin air or some evil machinations of the EU. It was first presented as a way of having no hard border between the SM and the UK on the island of Ireland. If you are to have completely uninhibited transmission of goods you must have the same rules on both sides. May agreed to this but the DUP didn't because it put Ulster into a different position from rUK and might be thought a step towards Irish unity. Having been reminded where her majority came from Mrs May accepted that and proposed that the backstop apply not only to Ulster but to the whole of the UK.
The question for us going forward is do we want to effectively remain in the SM? If we do then the backstop is an extremely generous way of achieving this because it gives us access that other countries have to pay for. The price is regulatory alignment. I can live with that not least because we still have the option of ending regulatory alignment at any point if the EU did something more than normally stupid at the cost of leaving the SM at that point. If we want that "freedom" now we need a FTA which is going to be both complex and take a long time to put in place.
The deal gives us both options and time to think about them. It really is a no brainer that should be supported by everyone except those absolutely determined not to leave under any circumstances and those who live somewhere other than planet earth.
I'm sorry but I wholeheartedly agree with the DUP here. I do not think we need to have the same rules on both sides and if the price for that is a border so be it. However that should not be necessary. Alternatively we can go with the principle that existed within the predecessor EEC for decades before the EU harmoginised rules which is one of mutual recognition. An agreement to mutually-recognise regulations to keep an open border, even just within Ireland, should not be unreasonable. Its not as if we're going to then flood the EU market with dangerous lead toys etc
You can live with regulatory alignment but I can't. If we are a free nation we must be free to set our own regulations. For the duration of negotiating a FTA a temporary, time-limited transition is a reasonable compromise but an everlasting backstop is not.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
We trade in a substantial way with a lot of countries with whom we do not have trade agreements. The evidence that trade agreements have positive effects on trade is mixed at best and nearly always overstated by those who labour so hard to produce them. I therefore think that our trade with the EU will largely continue with or without a trade deal.
Any short term loss of competitiveness is likely to be offset by a fall in our currency, probably to about parity with the Euro. Imports might have a slightly more difficult time for the same reason but that would be a net gain for us. But as I say I could be wrong about this and it is an unnecessary risk to take.
My further concern about no deal is that the EU will (rightly) be quite pissed off. They offered us a generous package and we spurned it. Further co-operation and agreements with the EU will take place in a sub-optimal environment. This is difficult to quantify but again does not seem to be in our interests.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
No one ever talks about the risk of remaining. Are there really none?
As per my last response to you MM to a similar comment on Boris wasting money when Mayor.
You are just winding us up aren't you
So sue me.....
Wouldn't want to as I enjoy your posts too much. I think your posts have changed a lot from a few years ago. You are far more mellow these days and often put a smile on my face.
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
It depends on the costs and benefits.
I'm not an ideological no dealer, I would prefer a deal if possible. I am an ideological democrat though and to me the backstop is unconscionable. This isn't about cost/benefits, one is simply a deal-breaker.
It takes two to tango though. Clearly the Irish view certain things as a deal-breaker of their own, and have made that abundantly clear. Why is it unreasonable for us to do the same?
I'll try again. The backstop did not come out of thin air or some evil machinations of the EU. It was first presented as a way of having no hard border between the SM and the UK on the island of Ireland. If you are to have completely uninhibited transmission of goods you must have the same rules on both sides. May agreed to this but the DUP didn't because it put Ulster into a different position from rUK and might be thought a step towards Irish unity. Having been reminded where her majority came from Mrs May accepted that and proposed that the backstop apply not only to Ulster but to the whole of the UK.
The question for us going forward is do we want to effectively remain in the SM? If we do then the backstop is an extremely generous way of achieving this because it gives us access that other countries have to pay for. The price is regulatory alignment. I can live with that not least because we still have the option of ending regulatory alignment at any point if the EU did something more than normally stupid at the cost of leaving the SM at that point. If we want that "freedom" now we need a FTA which is going to be both complex and take a long time to put in place.
The deal gives us both options and time to think about them. It really is a no brainer that should be supported by everyone except those absolutely determined not to leave under any circumstances and those who live somewhere other than planet earth.
Quite right. The backstop thing was nothing more than an ERG-invented bogeyman. The purpose was to humiliate and ultimately destroy Theresa and then bring in a puppet leader. Obviously they had Boris in mind for this.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
No one ever talks about the risk of remaining. Are there really none?
Economically there aren't any really - it's the status-quo.
Politically - I believe the rise of Nigel is something HYUFD continually talks about if we don't leave
I work in high-tech manufacturing and I'm wondering which of the companies I'm currently bouncing job applications off of will still be here in six months if Boris has his way. Meanwhile the no-dealers are all buying unicorns with other peoples money. I despair.
First post by the way, I figured I'd lurked for too long. Hi.
blah, blah, bollocks, bollocks, bollocks....if the price for that is a border so be it...more bollocks
That line alone rules you out of any grown-up conversation about the issue. Or, if you will persist, it certainly rules out anyone taking you vaguely seriously about it.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
No one ever talks about the risk of remaining. Are there really none?
A brown manila envelope will drop onto your doormat the day after we decide to remain conscripting you to the EU Army.
I work in high-tech manufacturing and I'm wondering which of the companies I'm currently bouncing job applications off of will still be here in six months if Boris has his way. Meanwhile the no-dealers are all buying unicorns with other peoples money. I despair.
First post by the way, I figured I'd lurked for too long. Hi.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
We trade in a substantial way with a lot of countries with whom we do not have trade agreements. The evidence that trade agreements have positive effects on trade is mixed at best and nearly always overstated by those who labour so hard to produce them. I therefore think that our trade with the EU will largely continue with or without a trade deal.
Any short term loss of competitiveness is likely to be offset by a fall in our currency, probably to about parity with the Euro. Imports might have a slightly more difficult time for the same reason but that would be a net gain for us. But as I say I could be wrong about this and it is an unnecessary risk to take.
My further concern about no deal is that the EU will (rightly) be quite pissed off. They offered us a generous package and we spurned it. Further co-operation and agreements with the EU will take place in a sub-optimal environment. This is difficult to quantify but again does not seem to be in our interests.
With how many of those other countries have we spent decades building up integrated supply chains that depend on frictionless borders and mutual recognition of standards?
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
Yes. It's "economic models assume ab initio that Brexit, and in particular a No Deal Brexit, will be damaging to the economy, and the only question is how much. Only the models don't have a good track record, since they also assumed that voting for Brexit would damage the economy, even without actually leaving, due to the uncertainty. So we conclude that the model assumptions are inherently suspect, which renders the conclusions suspect as well."
It's a bit like using UN long term climate forecasts on the to prove global warming. Rising average temperatures is an input to those models, not an output. The relevant output in both cases is, "what kind of sensitivity does the undesirable negative outcome have to the severity of our lack of planning for it?"
I work in high-tech manufacturing and I'm wondering which of the companies I'm currently bouncing job applications off of will still be here in six months if Boris has his way. Meanwhile the no-dealers are all buying unicorns with other peoples money. I despair.
First post by the way, I figured I'd lurked for too long. Hi.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
No one ever talks about the risk of remaining. Are there really none?
A shock rise in the pound could create issues for exporters...
I work in high-tech manufacturing and I'm wondering which of the companies I'm currently bouncing job applications off of will still be here in six months if Boris has his way. Meanwhile the no-dealers are all buying unicorns with other peoples money. I despair.
First post by the way, I figured I'd lurked for too long. Hi.
Welcome...onboard!!!
(geddit?)
I think you'll have to explain it to me. I've spent too long on Faceache and my standard of humour has degraded a bit. Anything more complicated than "haha bums" stumps me these days...
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
No one ever talks about the risk of remaining. Are there really none?
Yes, but we can mitigate those risks though our influence as members.
Unless Scotland (or NI or Wales??) go for UDI, that seems unlikely. That is, of course, unless Brown expects Boris to be PM for a considerable amount of time.
Why is Scottish independence contingent upon PM Johnson being in office for a considerable amount of time?
In what way is the Union safer under PM Corbyn, PM Farage, PM McDonnell or PM Other?
Someone should offer Sturgeon the job. It would solve a lot of issues
PM Sturgeon’s Queen’s speech: the Act of Dissolution 2020.
England gets to have William and Scotland gets King Harry, who will become the northern monarch before his southern big brother (hopefully).
That we can do without. Lizzie maybe but we don't need the freeloaders.
It was the Norwegian settlement, after their successful independence referendum in 1905. They took the younger of the Danish princes as their monarch. His big brother only became monarch in Copenhagen long after his wee brother had been installed on the new throne in Oslo.
Harry strikes me as being more suited to the Scots than the über-English William.
As every English rugby supporter will tell you Prince William is not über-English. This is him celebrating Wales beating England in the World Cup.
Prince William is the next Prince of Wales and knows he will be King of Scotland, Canada and Australia and New Zealand too as it stands not just King of England.
He therefore can afford to let Harry favour England, while he is more flexible in his support
“while he is more flexible in his support”: exactly what I just said! William is über-English. ”Fexibility” of loyalty is the English to a tee.
Nice bit of racial stereotyping from a nationalist here! And they claim Scottish Nationalism is not racist. Oh, hang on being racist against the English is OK, like it is for the Left to be racist against Jews.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
We trade in a substantial way with a lot of countries with whom we do not have trade agreements. The evidence that trade agreements have positive effects on trade is mixed at best and nearly always overstated by those who labour so hard to produce them. I therefore think that our trade with the EU will largely continue with or without a trade deal.
Any short term loss of competitiveness is likely to be offset by a fall in our currency, probably to about parity with the Euro. Imports might have a slightly more difficult time for the same reason but that would be a net gain for us. But as I say I could be wrong about this and it is an unnecessary risk to take.
My further concern about no deal is that the EU will (rightly) be quite pissed off. They offered us a generous package and we spurned it. Further co-operation and agreements with the EU will take place in a sub-optimal environment. This is difficult to quantify but again does not seem to be in our interests.
With how many of those other countries have we spent decades building up integrated supply chains that depend on frictionless borders and mutual recognition of standards?
I would guess all of them but not to the same degree. Integrated supply chains make it more likely that our trade with the EU will continue unimpeded to any material extent, not less. At least in my view. Other views are available.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
No one ever talks about the risk of remaining. Are there really none?
Economically there aren't any really - it's the status-quo.
Politically - I believe the rise of Nigel is something HYUFD continually talks about if we don't leave
I work in high-tech manufacturing and I'm wondering which of the companies I'm currently bouncing job applications off of will still be here in six months if Boris has his way. Meanwhile the no-dealers are all buying unicorns with other peoples money. I despair.
First post by the way, I figured I'd lurked for too long. Hi.
Welcome...onboard!!!
(geddit?)
I thought the convention was to try and encourage new contributors.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
No one ever talks about the risk of remaining. Are there really none?
A shock rise in the pound could create issues for exporters...
It would hurt companies like Games Workshop who have an entirely UK based supply chain and export a lot of their product. For companies like the one I work for, not so much. Most of our process inputs are complex electronics denominated in dollars, so it might actually help our balance sheet to see the pound back at $1.50.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
No one ever talks about the risk of remaining. Are there really none?
A brown manila envelope will drop onto your doormat the day after we decide to remain conscripting you to the EU Army.
I work in high-tech manufacturing and I'm wondering which of the companies I'm currently bouncing job applications off of will still be here in six months if Boris has his way. Meanwhile the no-dealers are all buying unicorns with other peoples money. I despair.
First post by the way, I figured I'd lurked for too long. Hi.
Welcome...onboard!!!
(geddit?)
I think you'll have to explain it to me. I've spent too long on Faceache and my standard of humour has degraded a bit. Anything more complicated than "haha bums" stumps me these days...
oh just to use your username as part of the welcome.
Plus I think that "haha bums" can quite accurately sum up the level of debate on here at times.
Apparently the EU stopped us from having our fish and chips wrapped in newspaper and she’s looking forward to having that again . And the moron Tim Martin has sourced cheaper drinks now , ignoring the fact that we’re still in the EU so it never stopped him doing it anyway .
Some Leavers need to stop ringing into radio shows as it doesn’t help their cause !
I work in high-tech manufacturing and I'm wondering which of the companies I'm currently bouncing job applications off of will still be here in six months if Boris has his way. Meanwhile the no-dealers are all buying unicorns with other peoples money. I despair.
First post by the way, I figured I'd lurked for too long. Hi.
Welcome...onboard!!!
(geddit?)
I think you'll have to explain it to me. I've spent too long on Faceache and my standard of humour has degraded a bit. Anything more complicated than "haha bums" stumps me these days...
oh just to use your username as part of the welcome.
Plus I think that "haha bums" can quite accurately sum up the level of debate on here at times.
Hey, it's better than twitter. Which admittedly is like not being the drunk guy rolling in turds and shouting racist abuse at the police officers taking him away but you takes what you gets.
I'll try again. The backstop did not come out of thin air or some evil machinations of the EU. It was first presented as a way of having no hard border between the SM and the UK on the island of Ireland. If you are to have completely uninhibited transmission of goods you must have the same rules on both sides. May agreed to this but the DUP didn't because it put Ulster into a different position from rUK and might be thought a step towards Irish unity. Having been reminded where her majority came from Mrs May accepted that and proposed that the backstop apply not only to Ulster but to the whole of the UK.
The question for us going forward is do we want to effectively remain in the SM? If we do then the backstop is an extremely generous way of achieving this because it gives us access that other countries have to pay for. The price is regulatory alignment. I can live with that not least because we still have the option of ending regulatory alignment at any point if the EU did something more than normally stupid at the cost of leaving the SM at that point. If we want that "freedom" now we need a FTA which is going to be both complex and take a long time to put in place.
The deal gives us both options and time to think about them. It really is a no brainer that should be supported by everyone except those absolutely determined not to leave under any circumstances and those who live somewhere other than planet earth.
Good summary. The truth is that if we are to leave the EU (which we must if we are not to trash the 2016 Referendum) we must ratify the Withdrawal Agreement that has been painstakingly negotiated between the two relevant parties.
When will this truth be accepted?
I think at some point in 2020 under PM Boris Johnson and that it will happen before any general election.
I freely admit that this looks unlikely right now, but such is my belief.
Why? Because everything else looks even more unlikely.
How crap of an opposition do you have to be to be down 4% in mid term and after 9 years of a government who are a total shit show?
A Green-LD Remain Alliance would come top of the poll. Crikey. If these two parties could get their act together, then...????
I mean, I think a good 50-66% of the Green vote would vote Labour in the event of a Green-LD alliance (and many greens, like myself, probably tactically vote in our seats at a GE anyway)
The problem with these forecasts is that they tend to be reported through the prism of a particular event, e.g no deal brexit. It is entirely possible (And actually quite likely) that we have a recession in the event of revoke, WA or no deal, given that we virtually have zero growth at present, much of Europe is in the same boat, Trump has blown a bubble that will pop at some time and Asian economies are showing signs of stress. Whether we Brexit or not is not the principle driver. For sure, a no-deal Brexit does have impact but it will be events immediately following the no-deal that matter rather than the no deal itself and nobody can predict those with any certainty
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
No one ever talks about the risk of remaining. Are there really none?
Economically there aren't any really - it's the status-quo.
Politically - I believe the rise of Nigel is something HYUFD continually talks about if we don't leave
So status quo is risk free?
If you define risk as "deviation from the expected outcome", then yes, by definition.
If it's "deviation from the optimal outcome", then we're into an unresolvable argument about whether we'd be better off in or out in the short, medium and long term, plus a whole host of second, third and higher order effects, like whether the EU collapses at some point.
As a Green who has engaged with the internal conversation about potential deal with the LDs; it isn't going to happen. We don't trust them on policy, nor politics. It has happened in the past that we made agreements with them not to stand and they agreed, we stood down, and they stood anyway. Whilst Sian and Jonathan seem to be in favour, I would say 2/3rds of the membership are against.
So a deal that could give the Greens 6+ seats does not appeal? Clearly there are policy differences but all we are talking about are arrangements in maybe 30-50 seats.
Don't game FPTP and stay pure seems to be your approach.
I agree with you; the rest of the membership not so much. I think it is because we have lots of anti austerity ex Lab and ex LD voters who just do not trust the LD party on anything, either because of past relationships with the LD party turning sour or because they do not trust the word of LDHQ.
That was then this is now. But Greens were very happy to let the LDs stand aside and even in some places run their election campaigns at the 2019 locals. LD activists producing Green leaflets and then helping deliver them.
Do you know where they did that; would really interest me.
And Sian and Jon sent out an email a couple of weeks ago asking members if we thought a pact was a good idea. All convos I saw after that had ~2/3rds of members against.
I'll try again. The backstop did not come out of thin air or some evil machinations of the EU. It was first presented as a way of having no hard border between the SM and the UK on the island of Ireland. If you are to have completely uninhibited transmission of goods you must have the same rules on both sides. May agreed to this but the DUP didn't because it put Ulster into a different position from rUK and might be thought a step towards Irish unity. Having been reminded where her majority came from Mrs May accepted that and proposed that the backstop apply not only to Ulster but to the whole of the UK.
The question for us going forward is do we want to effectively remain in the SM? If we do then the backstop is an extremely generous way of achieving this because it gives us access that other countries have to pay for. The price is regulatory alignment. I can live with that not least because we still have the option of ending regulatory alignment at any point if the EU did something more than normally stupid at the cost of leaving the SM at that point. If we want that "freedom" now we need a FTA which is going to be both complex and take a long time to put in place.
The deal gives us both options and time to think about them. It really is a no brainer that should be supported by everyone except those absolutely determined not to leave under any circumstances and those who live somewhere other than planet earth.
I'm sorry but I wholeheartedly agree with the DUP here. I do not think we need to have the same rules on both sides and if the price for that is a border so be it. However that should not be necessary. Alternatively we can go with the principle that existed within the predecessor EEC for decades before the EU harmoginised rules which is one of mutual recognition. An agreement to mutually-recognise regulations to keep an open border, even just within Ireland, should not be unreasonable. Its not as if we're going to then flood the EU market with dangerous lead toys etc
You can live with regulatory alignment but I can't. If we are a free nation we must be free to set our own regulations. For the duration of negotiating a FTA a temporary, time-limited transition is a reasonable compromise but an everlasting backstop is not.
If you can’t live with regulatory alignment you’re not going to have a very long life. Perhaps what you need is a sense of perspective.
I'll try again. The backstop did not come out of thin air or some evil machinations of the EU. It was first presented as a way of having no hard border between the SM and the UK on the island of Ireland. If you are to have completely uninhibited transmission of goods you must have the same rules on both sides. May agreed to this but the DUP didn't because it put Ulster into a different position from rUK and might be thought a step towards Irish unity. Having been reminded where her majority came from Mrs May accepted that and proposed that the backstop apply not only to Ulster but to the whole of the UK.
The question for us going forward is do we want to effectively remain in the SM? If we do then the backstop is an extremely generous way of achieving this because it gives us access that other countries have to pay for. The price is regulatory alignment. I can live with that not least because we still have the option of ending regulatory alignment at any point if the EU did something more than normally stupid at the cost of leaving the SM at that point. If we want that "freedom" now we need a FTA which is going to be both complex and take a long time to put in place.
The deal gives us both options and time to think about them. It really is a no brainer that should be supported by everyone except those absolutely determined not to leave under any circumstances and those who live somewhere other than planet earth.
Good summary. The truth is that if we are to leave the EU (which we must if we are not to trash the 2016 Referendum) we must ratify the Withdrawal Agreement that has been painstakingly negotiated between the two relevant parties.
When will this truth be accepted?
I think at some point in 2020 under PM Boris Johnson and that it will happen before any general election.
I freely admit that this looks unlikely right now, but such is my belief.
Why? Because everything else looks even more unlikely.
Attaboy hang on in there. Everything else is unlikely, no deal is impossible. Free money laying it (no deal)? Not for me because that said there are also an awful lot of fucking idiots around. But WA it is as the only possible non absolutely absurd way forward for the UK.
Whoever is next PM, and it looks like being that absolute and utter supertwat Johnson, will come to realise that. As May realised it.
If house prices really do drop 8% next year and 5 year after then the Tories are finished. It is 1990s negative equity redux.
Didn't stop them winning in 1992.
And to add to this, you need to consider regional variations. If a national 8% fall in house prices is driven primarily by falls in London, I don't see how that damages the Tories all that much.
Is this one of those cases where the median house price could remain nominally flat but the "average" drops 8% as superheated London falls away ? I think divergence to that scale would be... unlikely but could be something like that. (-1% change outwith London -2% mean /-4% London for instance)
Cambridge has a 4% yoy fall, too. Though for much the same reasons.
The problem with these forecasts is that they tend to be reported through the prism of a particular event, e.g no deal brexit. It is entirely possible (And actually quite likely) that we have a recession in the event of revoke, WA or no deal, given that we virtually have zero growth at present, much of Europe is in the same boat, Trump has blown a bubble that will pop at some time and Asian economies are showing signs of stress. Whether we Brexit or not is not the principle driver. For sure, a no-deal Brexit does have impact but it will be events immediately following the no-deal that matter rather than the no deal itself and nobody can predict those with any certainty
As @another_richard pointed out earlier, we currently have a Parliament that is not amenable to decisive action. So the government is unlikely to be able to take controversial steps to mitigate damage, whichever slot of the roulette wheel the ball lands in.
I'll try again. The backstop did not come out of thin air or some evil machinations of the EU. It was first presented as a way of having no hard border between the SM and the UK on the island of Ireland. If you are to have completely uninhibited transmission of goods you must have the same rules on both sides. May agreed to this but the DUP didn't because it put Ulster into a different position from rUK and might be thought a step towards Irish unity. Having been reminded where her majority came from Mrs May accepted that and proposed that the backstop apply not only to Ulster but to the whole of the UK.
The question for us going forward is do we want to effectively remain in the SM? If we do then the backstop is an extremely generous way of achieving this because it gives us access that other countries have to pay for. The price is regulatory alignment. I can live with that not least because we still have the option of ending regulatory alignment at any point if the EU did something more than normally stupid at the cost of leaving the SM at that point. If we want that "freedom" now we need a FTA which is going to be both complex and take a long time to put in place.
The deal gives us both options and time to think about them. It really is a no brainer that should be supported by everyone except those absolutely determined not to leave under any circumstances and those who live somewhere other than planet earth.
Good summary. The truth is that if we are to leave the EU (which we must if we are not to trash the 2016 Referendum) we must ratify the Withdrawal Agreement that has been painstakingly negotiated between the two relevant parties.
When will this truth be accepted?
I think at some point in 2020 under PM Boris Johnson and that it will happen before any general election.
I freely admit that this looks unlikely right now, but such is my belief.
Why? Because everything else looks even more unlikely.
I hope you are right. My faith in rationality has taken a few dents of late.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
No one ever talks about the risk of remaining. Are there really none?
A shock rise in the pound could create issues for exporters...
The opposite is normally presented as the real risk and the one which is better appreciated. There are pluses and minuses both ways but the exchange risks are always presented with the bias (hidden or exposed) of the presenter.
I'll try again. The backstop did not come out of thin air or some evil machinations of the EU. It was first presented as a way of having no hard border between the SM and the UK on the island of Ireland. If you are to have completely uninhibited transmission of goods you must have the same rules on both sides. May agreed to this but the DUP didn't because it put Ulster into a different position from rUK and might be thought a step towards Irish unity. Having been reminded where her majority came from Mrs May accepted that and proposed that the backstop apply not only to Ulster but to the whole of the UK.
The question for us going forward is do we want to effectively remain in the SM? If we do then the backstop is an extremely generous way of achieving this because it gives us access that other countries have to pay for. The price is regulatory alignment. I can live with that not least because we still have the option of ending regulatory alignment at any point if the EU did something more than normally stupid at the cost of leaving the SM at that point. If we want that "freedom" now we need a FTA which is going to be both complex and take a long time to put in place.
The deal gives us both options and time to think about them. It really is a no brainer that should be supported by everyone except those absolutely determined not to leave under any circumstances and those who live somewhere other than planet earth.
Good summary. The truth is that if we are to leave the EU (which we must if we are not to trash the 2016 Referendum) we must ratify the Withdrawal Agreement that has been painstakingly negotiated between the two relevant parties.
When will this truth be accepted?
I think at some point in 2020 under PM Boris Johnson and that it will happen before any general election.
I freely admit that this looks unlikely right now, but such is my belief.
Why? Because everything else looks even more unlikely.
I hope you are right. My faith in rationality has taken a few dents of late.
The problem is that Boris has said we are leaving on October 31st - how does he not do that and survive.
Of course we should take the OBR scenario forecasts with a pinch of salt. @Philip_Thompson is right that a lot depends on the assumptions you input and that there is a lot of uncertainty about them, especially since nothing like a no-deal Brexit has ever been tried in an advanced Western economy in peacetime.
The only things is, if you need to apply a pinch of salt to the OBR forecasts, how many buckets of salt do you need to apply to forecasts based on airy hand-waving which assure us that it will all be fine? Do these Leavers ever even countenance the possibility that they might be wrong and the experts might be at least roughly right? And what happens if the experts are roughly right?
This is why I have always supported the deal despite being of the personal view that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated. I may be wrong and it is a stupid risk to take if it can be avoided. This seems, with respect to some of the more ideological no dealers, obvious.
What is the evidence that the consequences of no deal are being wildly overstated?
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
No one ever talks about the risk of remaining. Are there really none?
Yes, but we can mitigate those risks though our influence as members.
As non-members, not so much.
Do you have recent, meaningful examples of our ability to influence?
Attaboy hang on in there. Everything else is unlikely, no deal is impossible. Free money laying it (no deal)? Not for me because that said there are also an awful lot of fucking idiots around. But WA it is as the only possible non absolutely absurd way forward for the UK.
Whoever is next PM, and it looks like being that absolute and utter supertwat Johnson, will come to realise that. As May realised it.
In fact I'm more confident than ever - and I am laying '31 Oct No Deal' as if there is no tomorrow.
Plus, it's all win win for me from here. Given No Deal is a 'not happening' event (trust me) either we get the WA ratified (good) or we get a general election which will be the most exciting and meaningful and hardest to call in the whole of recorded human history.
As a Green who has engaged with the internal conversation about potential deal with the LDs; it isn't going to happen. We don't trust them on policy, nor politics. It has happened in the past that we made agreements with them not to stand and they agreed, we stood down, and they stood anyway. Whilst Sian and Jonathan seem to be in favour, I would say 2/3rds of the membership are against.
So a deal that could give the Greens 6+ seats does not appeal? Clearly there are policy differences but all we are talking about are arrangements in maybe 30-50 seats.
Don't game FPTP and stay pure seems to be your approach.
I agree with you; the rest of the membership not so much. I think it is because we have lots of anti austerity ex Lab and ex LD voters who just do not trust the LD party on anything, either because of past relationships with the LD party turning sour or because they do not trust the word of LDHQ.
That was then this is now. But Greens were very happy to let the LDs stand aside and even in some places run their election campaigns at the 2019 locals. LD activists producing Green leaflets and then helping deliver them.
Do you know where they did that; would really interest me.
And Sian and Jon sent out an email a couple of weeks ago asking members if we thought a pact was a good idea. All convos I saw after that had ~2/3rds of members against.
Big mistake if that is case. For a start, get Lucas back in her seat needs LibDems does it not?
I'll try again. The backstop did not come out of thin air or some evil machinations of the EU. It was first presented as a way of having no hard border between the SM and the UK on the island of Ireland. If you are to have completely uninhibited transmission of goods you must have the same rules on both sides. May agreed to this but the DUP didn't because it put Ulster into a different position from rUK and might be thought a step towards Irish unity. Having been reminded where her majority came from Mrs May accepted that and proposed that the backstop apply not only to Ulster but to the whole of the UK.
The question for us going forward is do we want to effectively remain in the SM? If we do then the backstop is an extremely generous way of achieving this because it gives us access that other countries have to pay for. The price is regulatory alignment. I can live with that not least because we still have the option of ending regulatory alignment at any point if the EU did something more than normally stupid at the cost of leaving the SM at that point. If we want that "freedom" now we need a FTA which is going to be both complex and take a long time to put in place.
The deal gives us both options and time to think about them. It really is a no brainer that should be supported by everyone except those absolutely determined not to leave under any circumstances and those who live somewhere other than planet earth.
Good summary. The truth is that if we are to leave the EU (which we must if we are not to trash the 2016 Referendum) we must ratify the Withdrawal Agreement that has been painstakingly negotiated between the two relevant parties.
When will this truth be accepted?
I think at some point in 2020 under PM Boris Johnson and that it will happen before any general election.
I freely admit that this looks unlikely right now, but such is my belief.
Why? Because everything else looks even more unlikely.
I hope you are right. My faith in rationality has taken a few dents of late.
The problem is that Boris has said we are leaving on October 31st - how does he not do that and survive.
The unyielding determination of our political classes to box themselves in before they negotiate drives me close to despair. We can only hope that Boris concludes that the only way he can deliver on his promise is to sign May's deal with some frankly irrelevant tweak and that enough Labour MPs are sufficiently scared of no deal to at least abstain.
Comments
As per my last response to you MM to a similar comment on Boris wasting money when Mayor.
You are just winding us up aren't you
No Deal Brexit before 1 Nov 6/4 (in from 5/2)
Revoke Article 50 in 2019 5/2
A 'clean break' Brexit will save us at least £24 billion a year and up to £50 billion a year on this article
https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/12/27/clean-brexit-is-the-way-to-go-saving-uk-24-billion-a-year-thank-you-goodbye-were-gone/
Plus I see even the OBR forecasts a No Deal recession would be over by 2021
Nor am I unduly surprised by the Tory assessment. Realistic, pragmatic and with reasonably arguable excuses well in hand.
I'm not an ideological no dealer, I would prefer a deal if possible. I am an ideological democrat though and to me the backstop is unconscionable. This isn't about cost/benefits, one is simply a deal-breaker.
It takes two to tango though. Clearly the Irish view certain things as a deal-breaker of their own, and have made that abundantly clear. Why is it unreasonable for us to do the same?
Boris has never been a Trump fanboy like Farage (or Piers Morgan), he even criticised Trump when Mayor but Trump also respects his position as POTUS and wants a productive relationship with Trump
We'd all end up like @TSE fashion victims !!!!!!!
(Boris, that is... no one could possibly suggest suggest TSE is anything but a serious fashionista.)
The question for us going forward is do we want to effectively remain in the SM? If we do then the backstop is an extremely generous way of achieving this because it gives us access that other countries have to pay for. The price is regulatory alignment. I can live with that not least because we still have the option of ending regulatory alignment at any point if the EU did something more than normally stupid at the cost of leaving the SM at that point. If we want that "freedom" now we need a FTA which is going to be both complex and take a long time to put in place.
The deal gives us both options and time to think about them. It really is a no brainer that should be supported by everyone except those absolutely determined not to leave under any circumstances and those who live somewhere other than planet earth.
I'm sure a bit of casual racism won't put him off.
As far as the LDs and Greens working together, not much to fight over here in East Ham if I'm being honest and I doubt Stephen Timms, clinging on by his fingertips to his 40,000 majority, will be losing a lot of sleep.
If there are local arrangements, there are local arrangements. I don't think there should be a national electoral pact. The same will be true of TBP and the Conservatives - I can imagine the TBP not wishing to contest some Conservative seats and very much wishing to contest others.
Of course, despite the calls for a purge of the unfaithful, it may be some Conservative associations choose not to deselect a sitting Conservative MP who takes a very different view to his or her leader on leaving the EU. I'm sure TBP will be only too happy to contest those seats - it may of course be other parties will choose not to oppose an anti-Boris Conservative.
Just a thought on sales - if the population increases, it's likely the volume of sales will increase as well before every new person needs "things" which they have to buy. Rather like some of the other economic data trumpeted by one or two individuals, all it tells you is there are more people and people are cheap so firms hire people rather than seek to improve business efficiencies or productivity so productivity remains depressed but that doesn't matter as there are always more people willing and able to work.
By the way, that also explains the cap on wage increases but it doesn't tell you about growing skills shortages in key specialisms and professions. The Johnson future seems to be about the British worker washing the car, cleaning the house or poring coffee for some billionaire from somewhere in the world. Possibly not as attractive as it sounds (except for the billionaire of course).
Also, of course OBR forecasts that the recession ends. Recessions are always temporary and cyclical. The point is that GDP is permanently lower, meaning we are all poorer on average, and the government has less money net, even taking into account net EU contributions.
One of the many benefits of having voted to leave the EU.
There is one glaring and very high profile exception of course. A person who quite blatantly does not respect the office one iota.
The name of this person is Donald Trump.
Is it any more compelling than parroting ‘some other forecasts were wrong on some other occasion’?
I voted green at the euros, but would be unlikely to at a GE without a pact with the LDs, partly as the vote is more wasted in FPTP but also because both parties can realistically only deliver by working with other parties. If they can't bring themselves to do that in a time of national crisis, what on earth is the point?
A cocoon for members to congratulate each other for being right whilst refusing to talk to the nation is never going to be attractive to enough people to create change. Minor parties have to be outward looking and willing to work with those they disagree with.
You can live with regulatory alignment but I can't. If we are a free nation we must be free to set our own regulations. For the duration of negotiating a FTA a temporary, time-limited transition is a reasonable compromise but an everlasting backstop is not.
We will have a new PM whose only qualifications are deliberately inaccurate journalism and mannered foolery.
Any short term loss of competitiveness is likely to be offset by a fall in our currency, probably to about parity with the Euro. Imports might have a slightly more difficult time for the same reason but that would be a net gain for us. But as I say I could be wrong about this and it is an unnecessary risk to take.
My further concern about no deal is that the EU will (rightly) be quite pissed off. They offered us a generous package and we spurned it. Further co-operation and agreements with the EU will take place in a sub-optimal environment. This is difficult to quantify but again does not seem to be in our interests.
Politically - I believe the rise of Nigel is something HYUFD continually talks about if we don't leave
First post by the way, I figured I'd lurked for too long. Hi.
(geddit?)
It's a bit like using UN long term climate forecasts on the to prove global warming. Rising average temperatures is an input to those models, not an output. The relevant output in both cases is, "what kind of sensitivity does the undesirable negative outcome have to the severity of our lack of planning for it?"
Yes, but we can mitigate those risks though our influence as members.
As non-members, not so much.
Plus I think that "haha bums" can quite accurately sum up the level of debate on here at times.
Apparently the EU stopped us from having our fish and chips wrapped in newspaper and she’s looking forward to having that again . And the moron Tim Martin has sourced cheaper drinks now , ignoring the fact that we’re still in the EU so it never stopped him doing it anyway .
Some Leavers need to stop ringing into radio shows as it doesn’t help their cause !
When will this truth be accepted?
I think at some point in 2020 under PM Boris Johnson and that it will happen before any general election.
I freely admit that this looks unlikely right now, but such is my belief.
Why? Because everything else looks even more unlikely.
If it's "deviation from the optimal outcome", then we're into an unresolvable argument about whether we'd be better off in or out in the short, medium and long term, plus a whole host of second, third and higher order effects, like whether the EU collapses at some point.
And Sian and Jon sent out an email a couple of weeks ago asking members if we thought a pact was a good idea. All convos I saw after that had ~2/3rds of members against.
Whoever is next PM, and it looks like being that absolute and utter supertwat Johnson, will come to realise that. As May realised it.
Plus, it's all win win for me from here. Given No Deal is a 'not happening' event (trust me) either we get the WA ratified (good) or we get a general election which will be the most exciting and meaningful and hardest to call in the whole of recorded human history.
Big mistake under FPTP.