Sunak’s hardline on the strikes could lead to his own destruction – politicalbetting.com

Richard_Tyndall said:

MaxPB said:

rkrkrk said:

Cookie said:

I'm sympathetic to those wanting pay increases in line with inflation. In particular, teaching ought to be a more highly valued profession. But:

- The only way for public sector workers to have more is for others to have less.

This is not how the economy works!

Paying teachers more will require tax rises or cuts elsewhere, that will other people poorer. That is the immediate effect.

Now you may say the case for teachers or some other public sector employees being paid more is worth the (most likely) tax rise or (less likely) cuts elsewhere. The teaching unions have to lay out a business plan for it just as I do when I make the case for members of my team getting pay rises. What additional responsibilities will they be taking on, what productivity gains can we expect from them and what will the end result be from the pay rises.

For nurses, the actual numbers are pretty easy to see, pay them a bit more, increase retention rates, increase training places due to better and more reliable staffing and ease the short term healthcare crunch and get the million "sick" back into work. That the government is unable to see this means they are still beholden to treasury groupthink. For teachers the case is much, much less clear cut. Teacher salaries in the UK are comparable to similar countries across Europe and there's not exactly a huge international market for teachers as there is for healthcare workers. There's also huge quality issues surrounding teaching and education in general, the sector seems to have decided bells and whistles like interactive whiteboards and touch screen tablets will make up for not actually teaching the kids very much, that may or may not be the fault of the DoE but that's where we're at.

But come on Max, you are the one who has been saying - with some justification - that we should be taxing the elderly more (or paying them less) to try and equalise the generational differences and to support working people more. This seems to me to be a damn good example of that.

Taz said:

Slightly embarrassing gaffe by rising labour star.

https://twitter.com/fullfact/status/1620026539403255809?s=61&t=19BXCNo86RDJ21wNQ1U0rQ

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

Richard_Tyndall said:

MaxPB said:

rkrkrk said:

Cookie said:

I'm sympathetic to those wanting pay increases in line with inflation. In particular, teaching ought to be a more highly valued profession. But:

- The only way for public sector workers to have more is for others to have less.

This is not how the economy works!

Paying teachers more will require tax rises or cuts elsewhere, that will other people poorer. That is the immediate effect.

Now you may say the case for teachers or some other public sector employees being paid more is worth the (most likely) tax rise or (less likely) cuts elsewhere. The teaching unions have to lay out a business plan for it just as I do when I make the case for members of my team getting pay rises. What additional responsibilities will they be taking on, what productivity gains can we expect from them and what will the end result be from the pay rises.

For nurses, the actual numbers are pretty easy to see, pay them a bit more, increase retention rates, increase training places due to better and more reliable staffing and ease the short term healthcare crunch and get the million "sick" back into work. That the government is unable to see this means they are still beholden to treasury groupthink. For teachers the case is much, much less clear cut. Teacher salaries in the UK are comparable to similar countries across Europe and there's not exactly a huge international market for teachers as there is for healthcare workers. There's also huge quality issues surrounding teaching and education in general, the sector seems to have decided bells and whistles like interactive whiteboards and touch screen tablets will make up for not actually teaching the kids very much, that may or may not be the fault of the DoE but that's where we're at.

But come on Max, you are the one who has been saying - with some justification - that we should be taxing the elderly more (or paying them less) to try and equalise the generational differences and to support working people more. This seems to me to be a damn good example of that.

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Cicero said:

Driver said:

Cicero said:

HYUFD said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

I think rather that your ideal Brexit (with which I have a great deal of sympathy) was always impossible.

Note that many of those arguing it hasn't been done properly are implacably opposed to what you would want.

But that is always the way. Just as the vision that many (most?) Remainers had of the UKs position within the EU was always impossible. But you argue and campaign for what you see as the ideal and then settle for something less but still better than the alternative. Those who deal in absolutes on any side are, quite frankly, fools.

Thats why I favour PR.
It would give pragmatists like you and me more influence (compared to the current close to nil).

Selfish, perhaps, but I think it would also benefit the country.

PR would also give RefUK at least 50 MPs now and Corbynites 50 to 100 MPs too.

Italy even has a far right PM now with PR

...and the UK has had at least three without PR, Your point is?

"at least three far right PMs"? Go on: name them.

May, Johnson, Truss. All from the right of the already fairly right wing Conservatives.

"if you are citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere, you do not know what citizenship means"-- one of the most disgraceful speeches ever given by a serving Prime Minister.

The previous generation of Tories would have given it very short shrift.

You can hardly deny that the Tories are no longer "centre-right", indeed ever since they left the EPP they have been well to the right of any of the traditionally Conservative European right-wing parties.

Cameron was probably the last "Conservative" leader.

Nah that is genuinely rubbish. It would be like me describing Starmer or Kinnock as Communists simply because they were to the left of Blair. You lack perspective. And again I say that as someone who detested May's authoritarianism, Johnson's lazy, irresponsible dishonesty and Truss's ineptitude and arrogance. But none of them were 'far right' by either British or European standards.

I thought 3 was a massive underestimate.
But I did misread PM as MP...

Richard_Tyndall said:

nico679 said:

From its the wrong type of Brexit to it will take 30 years to see the benefits the list of excuses from the Leave cabal is now very tiresome.

Not half as tiresome as the whining from the irreconcilable remoaners.

MaxPB said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

MaxPB said:

rkrkrk said:

Cookie said:

I'm sympathetic to those wanting pay increases in line with inflation. In particular, teaching ought to be a more highly valued profession. But:

- The only way for public sector workers to have more is for others to have less.

This is not how the economy works!

Paying teachers more will require tax rises or cuts elsewhere, that will other people poorer. That is the immediate effect.

Now you may say the case for teachers or some other public sector employees being paid more is worth the (most likely) tax rise or (less likely) cuts elsewhere. The teaching unions have to lay out a business plan for it just as I do when I make the case for members of my team getting pay rises. What additional responsibilities will they be taking on, what productivity gains can we expect from them and what will the end result be from the pay rises.

For nurses, the actual numbers are pretty easy to see, pay them a bit more, increase retention rates, increase training places due to better and more reliable staffing and ease the short term healthcare crunch and get the million "sick" back into work. That the government is unable to see this means they are still beholden to treasury groupthink. For teachers the case is much, much less clear cut. Teacher salaries in the UK are comparable to similar countries across Europe and there's not exactly a huge international market for teachers as there is for healthcare workers. There's also huge quality issues surrounding teaching and education in general, the sector seems to have decided bells and whistles like interactive whiteboards and touch screen tablets will make up for not actually teaching the kids very much, that may or may not be the fault of the DoE but that's where we're at.

But come on Max, you are the one who has been saying - with some justification - that we should be taxing the elderly more (or paying them less) to try and equalise the generational differences and to support working people more. This seems to me to be a damn good example of that.

But that's not what's going to happen, the cost of public sector pay rises and following pension costs will be lumped onto working age people and backloaded onto the young rather than the almost of retirement age.

Both the Tories and Labour seem incapable of standing up to my parents generation and calling them out for what they are, selfish and greedy. The next big clash will be intergenerational, one of the parties (my money is actually on the Tories, oddly) will decide to go all in on a new strategy within 5-7 years and start campaigning on how shit of a deal young people get, simply it's where the votes will be in the 2030s and 2040s.

TimS said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Cicero said:

Driver said:

Cicero said:

HYUFD said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

I think rather that your ideal Brexit (with which I have a great deal of sympathy) was always impossible.

Note that many of those arguing it hasn't been done properly are implacably opposed to what you would want.

But that is always the way. Just as the vision that many (most?) Remainers had of the UKs position within the EU was always impossible. But you argue and campaign for what you see as the ideal and then settle for something less but still better than the alternative. Those who deal in absolutes on any side are, quite frankly, fools.

Thats why I favour PR.
It would give pragmatists like you and me more influence (compared to the current close to nil).

Selfish, perhaps, but I think it would also benefit the country.

PR would also give RefUK at least 50 MPs now and Corbynites 50 to 100 MPs too.

Italy even has a far right PM now with PR

...and the UK has had at least three without PR, Your point is?

"at least three far right PMs"? Go on: name them.

May, Johnson, Truss. All from the right of the already fairly right wing Conservatives.

"if you are citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere, you do not know what citizenship means"-- one of the most disgraceful speeches ever given by a serving Prime Minister.

The previous generation of Tories would have given it very short shrift.

You can hardly deny that the Tories are no longer "centre-right", indeed ever since they left the EPP they have been well to the right of any of the traditionally Conservative European right-wing parties.

Cameron was probably the last "Conservative" leader.

Nah that is genuinely rubbish. It would be like me describing Starmer or Kinnock as Communists simply because they were to the left of Blair. You lack perspective. And again I say that as someone who detested May's authoritarianism, Johnson's lazy, irresponsible dishonesty and Truss's ineptitude and arrogance. But none of them were 'far right' by either British or European standards.

I thought 3 was a massive underestimate.
But I did misread PM as MP...

I would say by global wing standards May was traditionalist right wing, Johnson populist hard right and Truss free market libertarian right. None far right, but none moderate centre-right either.

Richard_Tyndall said:

Not half as tiresome as the whining from the irreconcilable remoaners.

Beibheirli_C said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Not half as tiresome as the whining from the irreconcilable remoaners.

You are getting off lightly. Europhiles had to put with the antics and whining of Farage et al for several decades. The Brexit vote was not even a decade ago.

Driver said:

TimS said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Cicero said:

Driver said:

Cicero said:

HYUFD said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

I think rather that your ideal Brexit (with which I have a great deal of sympathy) was always impossible.

Note that many of those arguing it hasn't been done properly are implacably opposed to what you would want.

But that is always the way. Just as the vision that many (most?) Remainers had of the UKs position within the EU was always impossible. But you argue and campaign for what you see as the ideal and then settle for something less but still better than the alternative. Those who deal in absolutes on any side are, quite frankly, fools.

Thats why I favour PR.
It would give pragmatists like you and me more influence (compared to the current close to nil).

Selfish, perhaps, but I think it would also benefit the country.

PR would also give RefUK at least 50 MPs now and Corbynites 50 to 100 MPs too.

Italy even has a far right PM now with PR

...and the UK has had at least three without PR, Your point is?

"at least three far right PMs"? Go on: name them.

May, Johnson, Truss. All from the right of the already fairly right wing Conservatives.

"if you are citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere, you do not know what citizenship means"-- one of the most disgraceful speeches ever given by a serving Prime Minister.

The previous generation of Tories would have given it very short shrift.

You can hardly deny that the Tories are no longer "centre-right", indeed ever since they left the EPP they have been well to the right of any of the traditionally Conservative European right-wing parties.

Cameron was probably the last "Conservative" leader.

Nah that is genuinely rubbish. It would be like me describing Starmer or Kinnock as Communists simply because they were to the left of Blair. You lack perspective. And again I say that as someone who detested May's authoritarianism, Johnson's lazy, irresponsible dishonesty and Truss's ineptitude and arrogance. But none of them were 'far right' by either British or European standards.

I thought 3 was a massive underestimate.
But I did misread PM as MP...

I would say by global wing standards May was traditionalist right wing, Johnson populist hard right and Truss free market libertarian right. None far right, but none moderate centre-right either.

That's a reasonable analysis, except Boris was really not that far right (though populist, yes). I think Cicero was using "far right" in its abusive sense of "person on the right that I hate".

Driver said:

Beibheirli_C said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Not half as tiresome as the whining from the irreconcilable remoaners.

You are getting off lightly. Europhiles had to put with the antics and whining of Farage et al for several decades. The Brexit vote was not even a decade ago.

They could have stopped it by giving us a referendum on Maastricht, the euro, or the constitution in either of its guises amongst other opportunities.

TimS said:

Driver said:

TimS said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Cicero said:

Driver said:

Cicero said:

HYUFD said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

I think rather that your ideal Brexit (with which I have a great deal of sympathy) was always impossible.

Note that many of those arguing it hasn't been done properly are implacably opposed to what you would want.

But that is always the way. Just as the vision that many (most?) Remainers had of the UKs position within the EU was always impossible. But you argue and campaign for what you see as the ideal and then settle for something less but still better than the alternative. Those who deal in absolutes on any side are, quite frankly, fools.

Thats why I favour PR.
It would give pragmatists like you and me more influence (compared to the current close to nil).

Selfish, perhaps, but I think it would also benefit the country.

PR would also give RefUK at least 50 MPs now and Corbynites 50 to 100 MPs too.

Italy even has a far right PM now with PR

...and the UK has had at least three without PR, Your point is?

"at least three far right PMs"? Go on: name them.

May, Johnson, Truss. All from the right of the already fairly right wing Conservatives.

"if you are citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere, you do not know what citizenship means"-- one of the most disgraceful speeches ever given by a serving Prime Minister.

The previous generation of Tories would have given it very short shrift.

You can hardly deny that the Tories are no longer "centre-right", indeed ever since they left the EPP they have been well to the right of any of the traditionally Conservative European right-wing parties.

Cameron was probably the last "Conservative" leader.

Nah that is genuinely rubbish. It would be like me describing Starmer or Kinnock as Communists simply because they were to the left of Blair. You lack perspective. And again I say that as someone who detested May's authoritarianism, Johnson's lazy, irresponsible dishonesty and Truss's ineptitude and arrogance. But none of them were 'far right' by either British or European standards.

I thought 3 was a massive underestimate.
But I did misread PM as MP...

I would say by global wing standards May was traditionalist right wing, Johnson populist hard right and Truss free market libertarian right. None far right, but none moderate centre-right either.

That's a reasonable analysis, except Boris was really not that far right (though populist, yes). I think Cicero was using "far right" in its abusive sense of "person on the right that I hate".

Hard right not far right for Johnson. Slightly different (basically less skinheady).

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

Beibheirli_C said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Not half as tiresome as the whining from the irreconcilable remoaners.

You are getting off lightly. Europhiles had to put with the antics and whining of Farage et al for several decades. The Brexit vote was not even a decade ago.

They could have stopped it by giving us a referendum on Maastricht, the euro, or the constitution in either of its guises amongst other opportunities.

They?

I couldn't have done any of those things so I feel I am perfectly at liberty to point out what a disaster Brexit is. As predicted.

Driver said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

It shouldn't have been an impossible thing for the losers to have accepted defeat and worked for the option that from their point of view was the less bad.

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

Not at all. If we only made changes that were 100% bound to work in the any we wanted and were proofed against any possible abuse, irrespective of how much the system we were seeking to change had failed, then we would still all be living under the feudal system. All change has its shortcomings. And the idea of the status quo over any length of time is, in itself, ether possible or desirable is another of those 'impossible things'.

Your political antenna let you down, Richard, you let your idealism get the better of you.

You should have taken a look at all the politicians you rightly excoriate and asked yourself the question: "are these people likely not to make a complete hash of it?"

The answer after the briefest moment of contemplation is of course that they would be guaranteed to make a hash of it yet you still voted for it.

Now that is weird.

Driver said:

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

Beibheirli_C said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Not half as tiresome as the whining from the irreconcilable remoaners.

You are getting off lightly. Europhiles had to put with the antics and whining of Farage et al for several decades. The Brexit vote was not even a decade ago.

They could have stopped it by giving us a referendum on Maastricht, the euro, or the constitution in either of its guises amongst other opportunities.

They?

I couldn't have done any of those things so I feel I am perfectly at liberty to point out what a disaster Brexit is. As predicted.

You could have voted for a party that would have.

Driver said:

TimS said:

Driver said:

TimS said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Cicero said:

Driver said:

Cicero said:

HYUFD said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

I think rather that your ideal Brexit (with which I have a great deal of sympathy) was always impossible.

Note that many of those arguing it hasn't been done properly are implacably opposed to what you would want.

But that is always the way. Just as the vision that many (most?) Remainers had of the UKs position within the EU was always impossible. But you argue and campaign for what you see as the ideal and then settle for something less but still better than the alternative. Those who deal in absolutes on any side are, quite frankly, fools.

Thats why I favour PR.
It would give pragmatists like you and me more influence (compared to the current close to nil).

Selfish, perhaps, but I think it would also benefit the country.

PR would also give RefUK at least 50 MPs now and Corbynites 50 to 100 MPs too.

Italy even has a far right PM now with PR

...and the UK has had at least three without PR, Your point is?

"at least three far right PMs"? Go on: name them.

May, Johnson, Truss. All from the right of the already fairly right wing Conservatives.

"if you are citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere, you do not know what citizenship means"-- one of the most disgraceful speeches ever given by a serving Prime Minister.

The previous generation of Tories would have given it very short shrift.

You can hardly deny that the Tories are no longer "centre-right", indeed ever since they left the EPP they have been well to the right of any of the traditionally Conservative European right-wing parties.

Cameron was probably the last "Conservative" leader.

Nah that is genuinely rubbish. It would be like me describing Starmer or Kinnock as Communists simply because they were to the left of Blair. You lack perspective. And again I say that as someone who detested May's authoritarianism, Johnson's lazy, irresponsible dishonesty and Truss's ineptitude and arrogance. But none of them were 'far right' by either British or European standards.

I thought 3 was a massive underestimate.
But I did misread PM as MP...

I would say by global wing standards May was traditionalist right wing, Johnson populist hard right and Truss free market libertarian right. None far right, but none moderate centre-right either.

That's a reasonable analysis, except Boris was really not that far right (though populist, yes). I think Cicero was using "far right" in its abusive sense of "person on the right that I hate".

Hard right not far right for Johnson. Slightly different (basically less skinheady).

He wasn't really very right at all, whatever the adjective.

IanB2 said:

MaxPB said:

IanB2 said:

MaxPB said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

MaxPB said:

rkrkrk said:

Cookie said:

I'm sympathetic to those wanting pay increases in line with inflation. In particular, teaching ought to be a more highly valued profession. But:

- The only way for public sector workers to have more is for others to have less.

This is not how the economy works!

Paying teachers more will require tax rises or cuts elsewhere, that will other people poorer. That is the immediate effect.

Now you may say the case for teachers or some other public sector employees being paid more is worth the (most likely) tax rise or (less likely) cuts elsewhere. The teaching unions have to lay out a business plan for it just as I do when I make the case for members of my team getting pay rises. What additional responsibilities will they be taking on, what productivity gains can we expect from them and what will the end result be from the pay rises.

For nurses, the actual numbers are pretty easy to see, pay them a bit more, increase retention rates, increase training places due to better and more reliable staffing and ease the short term healthcare crunch and get the million "sick" back into work. That the government is unable to see this means they are still beholden to treasury groupthink. For teachers the case is much, much less clear cut. Teacher salaries in the UK are comparable to similar countries across Europe and there's not exactly a huge international market for teachers as there is for healthcare workers. There's also huge quality issues surrounding teaching and education in general, the sector seems to have decided bells and whistles like interactive whiteboards and touch screen tablets will make up for not actually teaching the kids very much, that may or may not be the fault of the DoE but that's where we're at.

But come on Max, you are the one who has been saying - with some justification - that we should be taxing the elderly more (or paying them less) to try and equalise the generational differences and to support working people more. This seems to me to be a damn good example of that.

But that's not what's going to happen, the cost of public sector pay rises and following pension costs will be lumped onto working age people and backloaded onto the young rather than the almost of retirement age.

Both the Tories and Labour seem incapable of standing up to my parents generation and calling them out for what they are, selfish and greedy. The next big clash will be intergenerational, one of the parties (my money is actually on the Tories, oddly) will decide to go all in on a new strategy within 5-7 years and start campaigning on how shit of a deal young people get, simply it's where the votes will be in the 2030s and 2040s.

Yep. That’s also the LibDems’ missed opportunity, which Clegg was feeling his way toward before 2010 but trashed with his record in coalition, and now the party is stuck representing a handful of seats mostly stuffed with winners from the current economic settlement, critically hampering their ability to put forward the radical changes that are needed.

Allowing fees to rise to £9k was both a disaster for the Lib Dems and the nation, in retrospect. There is no party for people under 40 (maybe even 50) to vote for that will look out for their interests, and therefore there is no party that gives any fucks about the future. It's all about solving today's problems with tomorrow's money. Borrowing for current spending should not be possible, yet the UK, along with many other countries, seems to be addicted to it and all it does is bring forwards economic activity from future years to cover for low productivity.

The LibDems were laying the foundations of being the party for the young - not just tuition fees but their policies on housing, the first party to propose a wealth tax, their political reform agenda, votes at 16, and their liberal approach to social issues that broadly aligns with the views of the upcoming generation. The coalition blew this apart, and the party doesn’t now have the courage to advocate the changes that are needed, because radical wealth taxes probably won’t go down well in the handful of very middle class seats that is pretty much all they have left.

Driver said:

TimS said:

Driver said:

TimS said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Cicero said:

Driver said:

Cicero said:

HYUFD said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

I think rather that your ideal Brexit (with which I have a great deal of sympathy) was always impossible.

Note that many of those arguing it hasn't been done properly are implacably opposed to what you would want.

But that is always the way. Just as the vision that many (most?) Remainers had of the UKs position within the EU was always impossible. But you argue and campaign for what you see as the ideal and then settle for something less but still better than the alternative. Those who deal in absolutes on any side are, quite frankly, fools.

Thats why I favour PR.
It would give pragmatists like you and me more influence (compared to the current close to nil).

Selfish, perhaps, but I think it would also benefit the country.

PR would also give RefUK at least 50 MPs now and Corbynites 50 to 100 MPs too.

Italy even has a far right PM now with PR

...and the UK has had at least three without PR, Your point is?

"at least three far right PMs"? Go on: name them.

May, Johnson, Truss. All from the right of the already fairly right wing Conservatives.

"if you are citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere, you do not know what citizenship means"-- one of the most disgraceful speeches ever given by a serving Prime Minister.

The previous generation of Tories would have given it very short shrift.

You can hardly deny that the Tories are no longer "centre-right", indeed ever since they left the EPP they have been well to the right of any of the traditionally Conservative European right-wing parties.

Cameron was probably the last "Conservative" leader.

Nah that is genuinely rubbish. It would be like me describing Starmer or Kinnock as Communists simply because they were to the left of Blair. You lack perspective. And again I say that as someone who detested May's authoritarianism, Johnson's lazy, irresponsible dishonesty and Truss's ineptitude and arrogance. But none of them were 'far right' by either British or European standards.

I thought 3 was a massive underestimate.
But I did misread PM as MP...

I would say by global wing standards May was traditionalist right wing, Johnson populist hard right and Truss free market libertarian right. None far right, but none moderate centre-right either.

That's a reasonable analysis, except Boris was really not that far right (though populist, yes). I think Cicero was using "far right" in its abusive sense of "person on the right that I hate".

Hard right not far right for Johnson. Slightly different (basically less skinheady).

He wasn't really very right at all, whatever the adjective.

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

Not at all. If we only made changes that were 100% bound to work in the any we wanted and were proofed against any possible abuse, irrespective of how much the system we were seeking to change had failed, then we would still all be living under the feudal system. All change has its shortcomings. And the idea of the status quo over any length of time is, in itself, ether possible or desirable is another of those 'impossible things'.

Your political antenna let you down, Richard, you let your idealism get the better of you.

You should have taken a look at all the politicians you rightly excoriate and asked yourself the question: "are these people likely not to make a complete hash of it?"

The answer after the briefest moment of contemplation is of course that they would be guaranteed to make a hash of it yet you still voted for it.

Now that is weird.

Not at all. Unless you are claiming that all possible candidates for PM were ignorant, dishonest incompetents. Which, given that until that point this was your party (and note, not mine) would be a remarkable claim. Bear in mind May was a Remainer and previous Home Secretary in a Government you supported.

Brexit was necessary no matter who was going to be running the country afterwards. There was no status quo and the longer we waited to leave the more difficult it would have been. You only have to look at the recent Elysee statement to see it is filled with the sorts of things Remain supporters said would not happen.

And, as I say, had we voted the other way we would have been having exactly the same arguments now in reverse.

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

Not at all. If we only made changes that were 100% bound to work in the any we wanted and were proofed against any possible abuse, irrespective of how much the system we were seeking to change had failed, then we would still all be living under the feudal system. All change has its shortcomings. And the idea of the status quo over any length of time is, in itself, ether possible or desirable is another of those 'impossible things'.

Your political antenna let you down, Richard, you let your idealism get the better of you.

You should have taken a look at all the politicians you rightly excoriate and asked yourself the question: "are these people likely not to make a complete hash of it?"

The answer after the briefest moment of contemplation is of course that they would be guaranteed to make a hash of it yet you still voted for it.

Now that is weird.

Not at all. Unless you are claiming that all possible candidates for PM were ignorant, dishonest incompetents. Which, given that until that point this was your party (and note, not mine) would be a remarkable claim. Bear in mind May was a Remainer and previous Home Secretary in a Government you supported.

Brexit was necessary no matter who was going to be running the country afterwards. There was no status quo and the longer we waited to leave the more difficult it would have been. You only have to look at the recent Elysee statement to see it is filled with the sorts of things Remain supporters said would not happen.

And, as I say, had we voted the other way we would have been having exactly the same arguments now in reverse.

Your position of any flavour of Brexit is better than having stayed in is consistent. But it slightly throws those who are in a less fortunate position than you are to the dogs. As we are seeing with the IMF forecast.

Your idealism meant that you would rather conduct a huge experiment with the country, suspecting that it would fail but at least we tried, than opt for a more moderate course which would likely have protected a greater number of needy people.

You were in that fortunate position to be able to conduct that experiment and hence again the similarity to socialism.

I couldn't possibly call you a Champagne Brexiter, but perhaps a Medium Sweet English Sparkling White one.

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

Beibheirli_C said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Not half as tiresome as the whining from the irreconcilable remoaners.

You are getting off lightly. Europhiles had to put with the antics and whining of Farage et al for several decades. The Brexit vote was not even a decade ago.

They could have stopped it by giving us a referendum on Maastricht, the euro, or the constitution in either of its guises amongst other opportunities.

They?

I couldn't have done any of those things so I feel I am perfectly at liberty to point out what a disaster Brexit is. As predicted.

You could have voted for a party that would have.

Which party should I have voted for to get a referendum on Maastrict? I certainly never voted for the party that signed up to it.

The euro? Remind me, when did we join the euro without a referendum?

Scott_xP said:

Beibheirli_C said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Not half as tiresome as the whining from the irreconcilable remoaners.

You are getting off lightly. Europhiles had to put with the antics and whining of Farage et al for several decades. The Brexit vote was not even a decade ago.

The sweet, sweet taste of Brexitears will keep us sustained for years to come...

Driver said:

TOPPING said:

Driver said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

It shouldn't have been an impossible thing for the losers to have accepted defeat and worked for the option that from their point of view was the less bad.

You mean the Labour Party in 2019 should have laid down their arms and worked with the Conservatives for the great bits of the Conservative Party manifesto?

Can't imagine why political opponents don't do that.

Any bright ideas?

No, I mean the Labour party in the 2015 parliament should, after the referendum, have worked constructively in parliament for the best available Brexit from their point of view.

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

Not at all. If we only made changes that were 100% bound to work in the any we wanted and were proofed against any possible abuse, irrespective of how much the system we were seeking to change had failed, then we would still all be living under the feudal system. All change has its shortcomings. And the idea of the status quo over any length of time is, in itself, ether possible or desirable is another of those 'impossible things'.

Your political antenna let you down, Richard, you let your idealism get the better of you.

You should have taken a look at all the politicians you rightly excoriate and asked yourself the question: "are these people likely not to make a complete hash of it?"

The answer after the briefest moment of contemplation is of course that they would be guaranteed to make a hash of it yet you still voted for it.

Now that is weird.

Not at all. Unless you are claiming that all possible candidates for PM were ignorant, dishonest incompetents. Which, given that until that point this was your party (and note, not mine) would be a remarkable claim. Bear in mind May was a Remainer and previous Home Secretary in a Government you supported.

Brexit was necessary no matter who was going to be running the country afterwards. There was no status quo and the longer we waited to leave the more difficult it would have been. You only have to look at the recent Elysee statement to see it is filled with the sorts of things Remain supporters said would not happen.

And, as I say, had we voted the other way we would have been having exactly the same arguments now in reverse.

Your position of any flavour of Brexit is better than having stayed in is consistent. But it slightly throws those who are in a less fortunate position than you are to the dogs. As we are seeing with the IMF forecast.

Your idealism meant that you would rather conduct a huge experiment with the country, suspecting that it would fail but at least we tried, than opt for a more moderate course which would likely have protected a greater number of needy people.

You were in that fortunate position to be able to conduct that experiment and hence again the similarity to socialism.

I couldn't possibly call you a Champagne Brexiter, but perhaps a Medium Sweet English Sparkling White one.

It was not an experiment but an inevitable necessity.

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

Beibheirli_C said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Not half as tiresome as the whining from the irreconcilable remoaners.

You are getting off lightly. Europhiles had to put with the antics and whining of Farage et al for several decades. The Brexit vote was not even a decade ago.

They could have stopped it by giving us a referendum on Maastricht, the euro, or the constitution in either of its guises amongst other opportunities.

They?

I couldn't have done any of those things so I feel I am perfectly at liberty to point out what a disaster Brexit is. As predicted.

You could have voted for a party that would have.

Which party should I have voted for to get a referendum on Maastrict? I certainly never voted for the party that signed up to it.

The euro? Remind me, when did we join the euro without a referendum?

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

Not at all. If we only made changes that were 100% bound to work in the any we wanted and were proofed against any possible abuse, irrespective of how much the system we were seeking to change had failed, then we would still all be living under the feudal system. All change has its shortcomings. And the idea of the status quo over any length of time is, in itself, ether possible or desirable is another of those 'impossible things'.

Your political antenna let you down, Richard, you let your idealism get the better of you.

You should have taken a look at all the politicians you rightly excoriate and asked yourself the question: "are these people likely not to make a complete hash of it?"

The answer after the briefest moment of contemplation is of course that they would be guaranteed to make a hash of it yet you still voted for it.

Now that is weird.

Not at all. Unless you are claiming that all possible candidates for PM were ignorant, dishonest incompetents. Which, given that until that point this was your party (and note, not mine) would be a remarkable claim. Bear in mind May was a Remainer and previous Home Secretary in a Government you supported.

Brexit was necessary no matter who was going to be running the country afterwards. There was no status quo and the longer we waited to leave the more difficult it would have been. You only have to look at the recent Elysee statement to see it is filled with the sorts of things Remain supporters said would not happen.

And, as I say, had we voted the other way we would have been having exactly the same arguments now in reverse.

Your position of any flavour of Brexit is better than having stayed in is consistent. But it slightly throws those who are in a less fortunate position than you are to the dogs. As we are seeing with the IMF forecast.

Your idealism meant that you would rather conduct a huge experiment with the country, suspecting that it would fail but at least we tried, than opt for a more moderate course which would likely have protected a greater number of needy people.

You were in that fortunate position to be able to conduct that experiment and hence again the similarity to socialism.

I couldn't possibly call you a Champagne Brexiter, but perhaps a Medium Sweet English Sparkling White one.

It was not an experiment but an inevitable necessity.

CD13 said:

Mr Tyndall,

I think you should be sympathetic to the Remainers. Their anger shows their helpless fury.

They know Cameron dropped a bollock by allowing democracy to rule, and they know the Government won't make that mistake again. Even if they tried, the French would make the terms impossible.

Driver said:

TimS said:

Driver said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

It shouldn't have been an impossible thing for the losers to have accepted defeat and worked for the option that from their point of view was the less bad.

It’s telling I think that people expect - and probably with some reason - higher standards from the remainder side than the brexiteers,
and are disappointed when they seem to be playing partisan political games. Whereas they expect Brexiteers to play partisan political
games and don’t think any the worse of them for that.

There’s a sense that the remainers were supposed to be the sensible ones. The mothers. Whereas for the leavers, well boys will be boys.

It's not quite as simple as that.

The ERG voted down May's deal because there was a deal available that, from their point of view, was better.

Labour (ringleader: Sir Keir Starmer) voted down May's deal even though there was no deal available that, from their point of view, was better.

It's pretty obvious that the latter deserves greater contempt.

Driver said:

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

Beibheirli_C said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Not half as tiresome as the whining from the irreconcilable remoaners.

You are getting off lightly. Europhiles had to put with the antics and whining of Farage et al for several decades. The Brexit vote was not even a decade ago.

They could have stopped it by giving us a referendum on Maastricht, the euro, or the constitution in either of its guises amongst other opportunities.

They?

I couldn't have done any of those things so I feel I am perfectly at liberty to point out what a disaster Brexit is. As predicted.

You could have voted for a party that would have.

Which party should I have voted for to get a referendum on Maastrict? I certainly never voted for the party that signed up to it.

The euro? Remind me, when did we join the euro without a referendum?

A referendum on the euro would have been an opportunity for the British people to make clear that they were unhappy with the direction of travel of the EU without having to pull out of the thing entirely. That could tehn have been leveraged into politial pressure against integration.

But Blair, Brown and Cameron couldn't see beyond integration.

Driver said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

Not at all. If we only made changes that were 100% bound to work in the any we wanted and were proofed against any possible abuse, irrespective of how much the system we were seeking to change had failed, then we would still all be living under the feudal system. All change has its shortcomings. And the idea of the status quo over any length of time is, in itself, ether possible or desirable is another of those 'impossible things'.

Your political antenna let you down, Richard, you let your idealism get the better of you.

You should have taken a look at all the politicians you rightly excoriate and asked yourself the question: "are these people likely not to make a complete hash of it?"

The answer after the briefest moment of contemplation is of course that they would be guaranteed to make a hash of it yet you still voted for it.

Now that is weird.

Not at all. Unless you are claiming that all possible candidates for PM were ignorant, dishonest incompetents. Which, given that until that point this was your party (and note, not mine) would be a remarkable claim. Bear in mind May was a Remainer and previous Home Secretary in a Government you supported.

Brexit was necessary no matter who was going to be running the country afterwards. There was no status quo and the longer we waited to leave the more difficult it would have been. You only have to look at the recent Elysee statement to see it is filled with the sorts of things Remain supporters said would not happen.

And, as I say, had we voted the other way we would have been having exactly the same arguments now in reverse.

Your position of any flavour of Brexit is better than having stayed in is consistent. But it slightly throws those who are in a less fortunate position than you are to the dogs. As we are seeing with the IMF forecast.

Your idealism meant that you would rather conduct a huge experiment with the country, suspecting that it would fail but at least we tried, than opt for a more moderate course which would likely have protected a greater number of needy people.

You were in that fortunate position to be able to conduct that experiment and hence again the similarity to socialism.

I couldn't possibly call you a Champagne Brexiter, but perhaps a Medium Sweet English Sparkling White one.

It was not an experiment but an inevitable necessity.

Well of course I disagree. In theory. In practice the country by 2019 absolutely wanted Brexit and they wanted it good and hard. And their wishes have been granted.

But staying in the EU was not as unimaginable as you maintain. Especially with Dave's Deal which protected against many of the federalist elements of the EU. And even without it we have been able, as with the Fiscal Compact, and the Euro for that matter, to decline to participate in various elements of that ever closer union.

Once the referendum result had been declared, staying in the EU was unimaginable.

Driver said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

Not at all. If we only made changes that were 100% bound to work in the any we wanted and were proofed against any possible abuse, irrespective of how much the system we were seeking to change had failed, then we would still all be living under the feudal system. All change has its shortcomings. And the idea of the status quo over any length of time is, in itself, ether possible or desirable is another of those 'impossible things'.

Your political antenna let you down, Richard, you let your idealism get the better of you.

You should have taken a look at all the politicians you rightly excoriate and asked yourself the question: "are these people likely not to make a complete hash of it?"

The answer after the briefest moment of contemplation is of course that they would be guaranteed to make a hash of it yet you still voted for it.

Now that is weird.

Not at all. Unless you are claiming that all possible candidates for PM were ignorant, dishonest incompetents. Which, given that until that point this was your party (and note, not mine) would be a remarkable claim. Bear in mind May was a Remainer and previous Home Secretary in a Government you supported.

Brexit was necessary no matter who was going to be running the country afterwards. There was no status quo and the longer we waited to leave the more difficult it would have been. You only have to look at the recent Elysee statement to see it is filled with the sorts of things Remain supporters said would not happen.

And, as I say, had we voted the other way we would have been having exactly the same arguments now in reverse.

Your position of any flavour of Brexit is better than having stayed in is consistent. But it slightly throws those who are in a less fortunate position than you are to the dogs. As we are seeing with the IMF forecast.

Your idealism meant that you would rather conduct a huge experiment with the country, suspecting that it would fail but at least we tried, than opt for a more moderate course which would likely have protected a greater number of needy people.

You were in that fortunate position to be able to conduct that experiment and hence again the similarity to socialism.

I couldn't possibly call you a Champagne Brexiter, but perhaps a Medium Sweet English Sparkling White one.

It was not an experiment but an inevitable necessity.

Well of course I disagree. In theory. In practice the country by 2019 absolutely wanted Brexit and they wanted it good and hard. And their wishes have been granted.

But staying in the EU was not as unimaginable as you maintain. Especially with Dave's Deal which protected against many of the federalist elements of the EU. And even without it we have been able, as with the Fiscal Compact, and the Euro for that matter, to decline to participate in various elements of that ever closer union.

Once the referendum result had been declared, staying in the EU was unimaginable.

Driver said:

ohnotnow said:

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-64463060

"More than 2,000 roles are at risk at Tesco as it announces more changes to the way it runs its supermarkets.
...
Tesco also announced it will close its counters and hot delis, with staff offered alternative jobs elsewhere."

Wonder if the others will follow...

Most such counters have, at least in this part of the country, already been closed. I think only Asda still has them.

Driver said:

TimS said:

Driver said:

TimS said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Cicero said:

Driver said:

Cicero said:

HYUFD said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Nigelb said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

I think rather that your ideal Brexit (with which I have a great deal of sympathy) was always impossible.

Note that many of those arguing it hasn't been done properly are implacably opposed to what you would want.

But that is always the way. Just as the vision that many (most?) Remainers had of the UKs position within the EU was always impossible. But you argue and campaign for what you see as the ideal and then settle for something less but still better than the alternative. Those who deal in absolutes on any side are, quite frankly, fools.

Thats why I favour PR.
It would give pragmatists like you and me more influence (compared to the current close to nil).

Selfish, perhaps, but I think it would also benefit the country.

PR would also give RefUK at least 50 MPs now and Corbynites 50 to 100 MPs too.

Italy even has a far right PM now with PR

...and the UK has had at least three without PR, Your point is?

"at least three far right PMs"? Go on: name them.

May, Johnson, Truss. All from the right of the already fairly right wing Conservatives.

"if you are citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere, you do not know what citizenship means"-- one of the most disgraceful speeches ever given by a serving Prime Minister.

The previous generation of Tories would have given it very short shrift.

You can hardly deny that the Tories are no longer "centre-right", indeed ever since they left the EPP they have been well to the right of any of the traditionally Conservative European right-wing parties.

Cameron was probably the last "Conservative" leader.

Nah that is genuinely rubbish. It would be like me describing Starmer or Kinnock as Communists simply because they were to the left of Blair. You lack perspective. And again I say that as someone who detested May's authoritarianism, Johnson's lazy, irresponsible dishonesty and Truss's ineptitude and arrogance. But none of them were 'far right' by either British or European standards.

I thought 3 was a massive underestimate.
But I did misread PM as MP...

I would say by global wing standards May was traditionalist right wing, Johnson populist hard right and Truss free market libertarian right. None far right, but none moderate centre-right either.

That's a reasonable analysis, except Boris was really not that far right (though populist, yes). I think Cicero was using "far right" in its abusive sense of "person on the right that I hate".

Hard right not far right for Johnson. Slightly different (basically less skinheady).

He wasn't really very right at all, whatever the adjective.

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

Not at all. If we only made changes that were 100% bound to work in the any we wanted and were proofed against any possible abuse, irrespective of how much the system we were seeking to change had failed, then we would still all be living under the feudal system. All change has its shortcomings. And the idea of the status quo over any length of time is, in itself, ether possible or desirable is another of those 'impossible things'.

Your political antenna let you down, Richard, you let your idealism get the better of you.

You should have taken a look at all the politicians you rightly excoriate and asked yourself the question: "are these people likely not to make a complete hash of it?"

The answer after the briefest moment of contemplation is of course that they would be guaranteed to make a hash of it yet you still voted for it.

Now that is weird.

Not at all. Unless you are claiming that all possible candidates for PM were ignorant, dishonest incompetents. Which, given that until that point this was your party (and note, not mine) would be a remarkable claim. Bear in mind May was a Remainer and previous Home Secretary in a Government you supported.

Brexit was necessary no matter who was going to be running the country afterwards. There was no status quo and the longer we waited to leave the more difficult it would have been. You only have to look at the recent Elysee statement to see it is filled with the sorts of things Remain supporters said would not happen.

And, as I say, had we voted the other way we would have been having exactly the same arguments now in reverse.

Your position of any flavour of Brexit is better than having stayed in is consistent. But it slightly throws those who are in a less fortunate position than you are to the dogs. As we are seeing with the IMF forecast.

Your idealism meant that you would rather conduct a huge experiment with the country, suspecting that it would fail but at least we tried, than opt for a more moderate course which would likely have protected a greater number of needy people.

You were in that fortunate position to be able to conduct that experiment and hence again the similarity to socialism.

I couldn't possibly call you a Champagne Brexiter, but perhaps a Medium Sweet English Sparkling White one.

It was not an experiment but an inevitable necessity.

Well of course I disagree. In theory. In practice the country by 2019 absolutely wanted Brexit and they wanted it good and hard. And their wishes have been granted.

But staying in the EU was not as unimaginable as you maintain. Especially with Dave's Deal which protected against many of the federalist elements of the EU. And even without it we have been able, as with the Fiscal Compact, and the Euro for that matter, to decline to participate in various elements of that ever closer union.

Once the referendum result had been declared, staying in the EU was unimaginable.

I agree it was too late then. But leaving could have been to a Swiss or Norway style arrangement. That would have deflated the Remainder opposition.

Mexicanpete said:

Driver said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

Not at all. If we only made changes that were 100% bound to work in the any we wanted and were proofed against any possible abuse, irrespective of how much the system we were seeking to change had failed, then we would still all be living under the feudal system. All change has its shortcomings. And the idea of the status quo over any length of time is, in itself, ether possible or desirable is another of those 'impossible things'.

Your political antenna let you down, Richard, you let your idealism get the better of you.

You should have taken a look at all the politicians you rightly excoriate and asked yourself the question: "are these people likely not to make a complete hash of it?"

The answer after the briefest moment of contemplation is of course that they would be guaranteed to make a hash of it yet you still voted for it.

Now that is weird.

Not at all. Unless you are claiming that all possible candidates for PM were ignorant, dishonest incompetents. Which, given that until that point this was your party (and note, not mine) would be a remarkable claim. Bear in mind May was a Remainer and previous Home Secretary in a Government you supported.

Brexit was necessary no matter who was going to be running the country afterwards. There was no status quo and the longer we waited to leave the more difficult it would have been. You only have to look at the recent Elysee statement to see it is filled with the sorts of things Remain supporters said would not happen.

And, as I say, had we voted the other way we would have been having exactly the same arguments now in reverse.

Your position of any flavour of Brexit is better than having stayed in is consistent. But it slightly throws those who are in a less fortunate position than you are to the dogs. As we are seeing with the IMF forecast.

Your idealism meant that you would rather conduct a huge experiment with the country, suspecting that it would fail but at least we tried, than opt for a more moderate course which would likely have protected a greater number of needy people.

You were in that fortunate position to be able to conduct that experiment and hence again the similarity to socialism.

I couldn't possibly call you a Champagne Brexiter, but perhaps a Medium Sweet English Sparkling White one.

It was not an experiment but an inevitable necessity.

Well of course I disagree. In theory. In practice the country by 2019 absolutely wanted Brexit and they wanted it good and hard. And their wishes have been granted.

But staying in the EU was not as unimaginable as you maintain. Especially with Dave's Deal which protected against many of the federalist elements of the EU. And even without it we have been able, as with the Fiscal Compact, and the Euro for that matter, to decline to participate in various elements of that ever closer union.

Once the referendum result had been declared, staying in the EU was unimaginable.

To the winners.

Driver said:

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

Benpointer said:

Driver said:

Beibheirli_C said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Not half as tiresome as the whining from the irreconcilable remoaners.

You are getting off lightly. Europhiles had to put with the antics and whining of Farage et al for several decades. The Brexit vote was not even a decade ago.

They could have stopped it by giving us a referendum on Maastricht, the euro, or the constitution in either of its guises amongst other opportunities.

They?

I couldn't have done any of those things so I feel I am perfectly at liberty to point out what a disaster Brexit is. As predicted.

You could have voted for a party that would have.

Which party should I have voted for to get a referendum on Maastrict? I certainly never voted for the party that signed up to it.

The euro? Remind me, when did we join the euro without a referendum?

A referendum on the euro would have been an opportunity for the British people to make clear that they were unhappy with the direction of travel of the EU without having to pull out of the thing entirely. That could tehn have been leveraged into politial pressure against integration.

But Blair, Brown and Cameron couldn't see beyond integration.

I suspect the UK will be back in the EU in time, 'maybe not in my lifetime but in yours'.

Possibly. But at least if we are it will be as a full member, which will be an improvement on the previous status.

Driver said:

Mexicanpete said:

Driver said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

IanB2 said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

TOPPING said:

Keystone said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I sense it will be sellable, the tide against Brexit is one way and it is powerful. You can feel it

The Tories have blown it. Blown Brexit

Not at all.

This version of Brexit is plausibly the best version there ever could be.

We told you before you voted for it, it would be a shitshow.

And now here we are...

Clearly bollocks from you as even most Remainers admit.

Richard is right. I bow to nobody in my loathing for Brexit and its proponents.

I still gnash my teeth when I remember how Gisela Stuart dissembled in the televised pre referendum debate about the effect on Northern Ireland.

But the truth is we have had a lowest decile Brexit. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for the Brexiteers has gone wrong - no US FTA, Trump lost to Biden, the EU played hardball (talking about Swexit and Italexit during negotiations was an own goal by Farage).

There have been almost no economic benefits from Brexit to talk about - and our post-Brexit trade deals under Truss were to our disadvantage.

Even the political mood music - continued political confrontation with the Citizens of Nowhere as part of a misguided Red Wall strategy - was ill chosen.

None of this was certain in 2016.

The worst thing is that I feel deep sympathy for committed Brexiteers. To work for something for decades and to see it mishandled so grievously must be really upsetting.

I hear kids in primary schools are now using Brexit as shorthand for screwed up. Not good.

And .ore widely - not good for the country. A period of competent administration is desperately needed.

This of course is the Brexit as socialism view. Brexit is pure and wonderful just that it hasn't been tried properly yet.

So the logical conclusion of your claim is that May, Johnson and Truss were top notch politicians and leaders who made no mistakes, created the best possible Brexit and were only bought low by the project rather than by their own incompetence and ineptitude? Its a 'courageous' theory at least.

But, like communism, it is no good having a world view that requires five impossible things before breakfast in order to work. If you support radical change it has to survive contact with the real, messy world - including the shortcomings of our rulers - otherwise when you are old you’ll just be sitting there, repeating over and over, “it would have worked, if only…if only….”

Not at all. If we only made changes that were 100% bound to work in the any we wanted and were proofed against any possible abuse, irrespective of how much the system we were seeking to change had failed, then we would still all be living under the feudal system. All change has its shortcomings. And the idea of the status quo over any length of time is, in itself, ether possible or desirable is another of those 'impossible things'.

Your political antenna let you down, Richard, you let your idealism get the better of you.

You should have taken a look at all the politicians you rightly excoriate and asked yourself the question: "are these people likely not to make a complete hash of it?"

The answer after the briefest moment of contemplation is of course that they would be guaranteed to make a hash of it yet you still voted for it.

Now that is weird.

Not at all. Unless you are claiming that all possible candidates for PM were ignorant, dishonest incompetents. Which, given that until that point this was your party (and note, not mine) would be a remarkable claim. Bear in mind May was a Remainer and previous Home Secretary in a Government you supported.

Brexit was necessary no matter who was going to be running the country afterwards. There was no status quo and the longer we waited to leave the more difficult it would have been. You only have to look at the recent Elysee statement to see it is filled with the sorts of things Remain supporters said would not happen.

And, as I say, had we voted the other way we would have been having exactly the same arguments now in reverse.

Your position of any flavour of Brexit is better than having stayed in is consistent. But it slightly throws those who are in a less fortunate position than you are to the dogs. As we are seeing with the IMF forecast.

Your idealism meant that you would rather conduct a huge experiment with the country, suspecting that it would fail but at least we tried, than opt for a more moderate course which would likely have protected a greater number of needy people.

You were in that fortunate position to be able to conduct that experiment and hence again the similarity to socialism.

I couldn't possibly call you a Champagne Brexiter, but perhaps a Medium Sweet English Sparkling White one.

It was not an experiment but an inevitable necessity.

Well of course I disagree. In theory. In practice the country by 2019 absolutely wanted Brexit and they wanted it good and hard. And their wishes have been granted.

But staying in the EU was not as unimaginable as you maintain. Especially with Dave's Deal which protected against many of the federalist elements of the EU. And even without it we have been able, as with the Fiscal Compact, and the Euro for that matter, to decline to participate in various elements of that ever closer union.

Once the referendum result had been declared, staying in the EU was unimaginable.

To the winners.

To any democrat.

Benpointer said:

There's a new thread with lots of Benpointer posts on it if anyone's interested.