So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

[Guy Profumo]

Has resigned as the UK's ambassador to the EU.

Who is May going to appoint to replace him?

[Toby Gymshorts]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

A pig's bladder on a stick. It'll do about as good a job as any of the other fuckers currently being bandied around.

Of course, the Daily Fail are clamouring for a "pro-Brexit" ambassador, completely ignoring all intelligence provided by the (hardly Europhile) Rogers relating to the task ahead.

We're fucked, in short. I mean, we were anyway, but this is just the cherry on the rancid cake.

[Evariste Euler Gauss]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

Well, that may be right on the basis that it's an impossible job being a diplomat with the task of saving anything from a situation trashed repeatedly by moronic and chaotic political masters. Hope that's what you meant.

[posted before TG's edit]

[Toby Gymshorts]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

That's exactly it, yes.

(Posted before EEG's edit. I'm confused.)

[ursus arctos]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

Farrage has thrown his hat into the ring

This is also being discussed on the Brexit thread, BTW

[Guy Profumo]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

Toby Gymshorts wrote: A pig's bladder on a stick. It'll do about as good a job as any of the other fuckers currently being bandied around.

Of course, the Daily Fail are clamouring for a "pro-Brexit" ambassador, completely ignoring all intelligence provided by the (hardly Europhile) Rogers relating to the task ahead.

We're fucked, in short. I mean, we were anyway, but this is just the cherry on the rancid cake.

Which names are being "bandied about"?

(I've seen arseholes suggesting Farridge and I've joked it should be Gove, but who has been suggested?)

[Toby Gymshorts]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

I just wrote a long and vitriolic post and lost it to the vagaries of Eurostar WiFi. Because of this I'm now a fervent Brexiter and Europe can GTF.

[Tubby Isaacs]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

Seeing that Sir Ivan Rogers looks to have spent his time lately explaining to David Davis, Liam Fox and Boris what the customs union and Single Market actually are, I don't think we need to worry too much about a replacement. Anybody who teaches Politics A level and enjoys a laugh will do.

[Guy Profumo]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

Tubby Isaacs wrote: Seeing that Sir Ivan Rogers looks to have spent his time lately explaining to David Davis, Liam Fox and Boris what the customs union and Single Market actually are, I don't think we need to worry too much about a replacement. Anybody who teaches Politics A level and enjoys a laugh will do.

Johnson. It's Johnson, not Boris.

How many more times?

[Snake Plissken]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

This is one of the few times I'd support Farage for the job. He was desperate for a high profile Ambassadorship and well, with his knowledge of the EU then surely he is the man for the job.

I want May to offer him the job, just so he would be forced to run away from it.

[Tubby Isaacs]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

Guy Profumo wrote:

Seeing that Sir Ivan Rogers looks to have spent his time lately explaining to David Davis, Liam Fox and Boris what the customs union and Single Market actually are, I don't think we need to worry too much about a replacement. Anybody who teaches Politics A level and enjoys a laugh will do.

Johnson. It's Johnson, not Boris.

How many more times?

I don't think my tone is in doubt when I call him that.

According to the Telegraph:

Senior Conservatives said that Sir Ivan’s resignation, which Number 10 was not warned about in advance, must now be seen as an opportunity to appoint a “Brexiteer” who will fight to get a good deal from Brussels.

Senior Conservatives called Iain Duncan Smith and Bernard Jenkin, unless Rees Mogg and Raab have been promoted. No other senior Conservative can be arsed to defend Brexit.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

Unless the british negotiator turns up with five tank divisions, I'm not sure that the UK is going to be able to fight for a better deal with the EU. The EU will ask do the UK want out of any of the four freedoms, or the ECJ, and if the UK says yes to any of them, then the EU will say fair enough, thank them for coming along, show them the door, and pencil in a few meetings to start discussing a trade deal in two years time.

[ursus arctos]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

Especially given the uncertainty created by the French and German elections.

Rogers' farewell email is worth reading.

My own view remains as it has always been. We do not yet know what the government will set as negotiating objectives for the UK's relationship with the EU after exit.

There is much we will not know until later this year about the political shape of the EU itself, and who the political protagonists in any negotiation with the UK will be.

But in any negotiation which addresses the new relationship, the technical expertise, the detailed knowledge of positions on the other side of the table - and the reasons for them, and the divisions amongst them - and the negotiating experience and savvy that the people in this building bring, make it essential for all parts of UKREP to be centrally involved in the negotiations if the UK is to achieve the best possible outcomes.
Serious multilateral negotiating experience is in short supply in Whitehall, and that is not the case in the Commission or in the Council.

. . .

I hope you will continue to challenge ill-founded arguments and muddled thinking and that you will never be afraid to speak the truth to those in power.

I hope that you will support each other in those difficult moments where you have to deliver messages that are disagreeable to those who need to hear them.

[Tubby Isaacs]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

Is there any chance of constructive dismissal? If somebody who didn't like him leaked his highly sceptical advice, that might be a problem for the government.

Hilarious IDS talking about civil servants telling him stuff couldn't be done. Probably their fault that up to £600m will be written off.

Kipper Trumpists reckon "civil servants" shouldn't be negotiating trade deals anyway. Not that ambassadors do that. But hey, sure a team of businessmen with a sense of patriotism are going to do better.

[Guy Profumo]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

And the winner (?) is...

Sir Tim Barrow

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

I was talking to a friend of mine who works in the Irish civil service, and I was asking him about what the fuck were we going to do given that the UK seemed to have gone off their meds. He was saying to me that things are pretty difficult for his counterparts in the NI civil service, who he had enormous professional respect for. Some of them might be the worst type of cunts you could meet, but the rest of Those poor cunts have to keep the show on the road, despite every single politician involved in the whole mess being of the very lowest calibre imaginable.

But he was saying that it was always possible to deftly keep the show on the road by hook or by crook in the past because there was only a limited number of things that could happen, and not very much could change. But now the bus of state was careering towards a cliff edge, while the govt had abandoned the steering wheel to lead the back of the bus in a rousing chorus of The white cliffs of Dover.

I imagine that being a UK career civil servant in the UK mission in the EU is probably a bit like the wermacht officers trapped in the Bunker in the final days. This really isn't going very well, this whole enterprise wasn't what you signed up for, and the people in charge are completely insane. Best empty the wine cellar.

[Tubby Isaacs]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

Jeez.

In successive interviews Iain Duncan Smith, the former work and pensions secretary, claimed that Rogers had a role in information embarrassing to ministers being leaked, that he was not trusted, and that he was kept out of the loop.

He better be sure about that. Could be a libel action. IDS can appoint Peter Lilley as the world's shittest barrister.

This letter was clearly intended and inevitably going to leak because he sent it to all his staff as an email, and it is written in a tone which is really designed for publication. So we know that at least one of his two leaked emails was made in a way that was designed to become public.

We can be sure Theresa May wouldn't want to force out a civil servant who stood up to her. Oh hang on...

On 8 November 2011 Clark formally resigned from the UK Border Agency insisting that comments made by the Home Secretary, Theresa May amounted to constructive dismissal and that he would launch legal proceedings.[9]

In mid-March 2012, it was reported that Mr Clark had reached an out-of-court settlement with the Home Office

For £225k.

[GCostanza]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

I'm not sure that comparison is quite on the same level somehow.

[Tubby Isaacs]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

I like the cut of Sir Ivan's jib more and more.

The Times (subscription) says having to deal with Liam Fox and David Davis helped to persuade Sir Ivan Rogers to resign.

Liam Fox and David Davis’s alleged failure to understand briefings in the weeks after their appointment left Sir Ivan Rogers in despair, friends have said. Britain’s top diplomat in Brussels, who resigned on Tuesday, considered quitting on more than one occasion after the referendum. (Politics Live, Guardian)

Like I said, the Brexit loons weren't wrong when they said it would be easy to replace him. Somebody who's taught Politics A level could do this.

[Tubby Isaacs]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

https://www.facebook.com/scientistsforeu/videos/946427022125974/

Scientists for EU
Yesterday at 13:37 ·

Where *is* Corbyn?! He's the leader of the opposition. Our EU ambassador has abruptly quit, with a letter about "speaking truth to power"... and there's not a peep from Corbyn about the government mess. Corbyn is not in the dozens of quotes across the news. A Google search on Corbyn & Ivan Rogers finds nada. Complete fail.

If Rogers wasn't a major story and point of principle in itself, the fact that trade unionists in FDA are very unhappy should surely have put it square on his radar.

I find it hard to believe any longer that Corbyn gives a solitary fuck about Brexit, or that he ever did.

[johnr]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

Tubby Isaacs wrote: https://www.facebook.com/scientistsforeu/videos/946427022125974/

Scientists for EU
Yesterday at 13:37 ·

Where *is* Corbyn?! He's the leader of the opposition. Our EU ambassador has abruptly quit, with a letter about "speaking truth to power"... and there's not a peep from Corbyn about the government mess. Corbyn is not in the dozens of quotes across the news. A Google search on Corbyn & Ivan Rogers finds nada. Complete fail.

If Rogers wasn't a major story and point of principle in itself, the fact that trade unionists in FDA are very unhappy should surely have put it square on his radar.

I find it hard to believe any longer that Corbyn gives a solitary fuck about Brexit, or that he ever did.

We've discussed here before how Corbyn has - since the leadership election - generally left his Shadows to attend to their brief - in this case, Starmer. Many people have replied to Scientists for EU with just that point.

[Tubby Isaacs]

So. Sir Ivan Rogers then

He didn't leave responding to the junior doctors' strike to Heidi Alexander. He and McDonnell were very visible.

The public never know many Opposition politicians. That's why the leader is so crucial, and has to chuck his weight behind important stuff.

He's on holiday in Mexico, and fair enough. But he has to be able to respond to events, and at least get something strong into print.