The Brexit Thread

[Lang Spoon]

No border with Big Island. Weren’t you listening? The other border, only taigs care about that.

[anton pulisov]

Jaysus, I knew the British government was incompetent, but now they are being outmanoeuvred on the diplomatic front by Simon Coveney.

That's literally like getting schooled by Dubya.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

If NI remained in the single market and customs union it would effectively be tethered to Ireland with the same laws and standards, and there would be a hard border between NI and the rest of the UK. England would have abandoned NI and the government would collapse without DUP support.

The Same laws? That's not really the way it works currently is it? If Northern Ireland was to remain in the single market and customs union, it would remain every bit as legally divergent from the republic as it is right now, and a bit more divergent from the UK than it currently is. And Northern Ireland is effectively tethered to the republic by geology economics, history, and international treaties.

The thing is that this is only one of a bunch of really unpalatable things that the Govt is going to have to swallow if it is going to get to discuss the beginnings of a trade deal. I really don't know if the Tories are going to be able to hold it together

[Patrick Thistle]

I have a sneaking suspicion that some vital components of British tea may actually be imported.

Hahaha. I saw Dorset tea for sale the other day. Bit more climate change and we probably can grow it.

[Eggchaser]

Non existent climate change is good for Brexit!

[Toby Gymshorts]

Easier to just bring India, etc. into the empire and oh hang on.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Can't link, but:

The Sports Minister Tracey Crouch thinks people have had enough of the "daily commentary" on the UK's EU departure.

She tells HuffPost UK people urge her in the street to "ask the BBC to stop reporting on Brexit".

"They want us to do it, they want us to get on with it. I'm not sure they necessarily want the daily commentary on it," she says.

With this in mind, she recently wrote her weekly newspaper column on The Great British Bake Off instead.
"The only Brexit they care about is getting the bread out of the oven in time," it said.

A government minister.

She's probably got a point.

I'm sure it's important what Rumpole Starmer's doing with amendments, but it probably looks like nitpicking to lots of the public. Maybe time to announce the full Norway, and front up to the public about the shit we're in.

[anton pulisov]

The Norwegian government would love to join the EU, but their people rejected it in a referendum.

So Norway has a "deal" whereby they pay membership fees and are a part of Schengen, and in return they can access the single market. All with no say as to what goes on in Brussels.

[Evariste Euler Gauss]

Did I miss the discussion on here of Corbyn whipping Labour to vote with the Tories on leaving the single market?

https://www.politicshome.com/news/uk...te-quit-single

I cannot find words to express how much I despise both the Tories and the Corbyn wing of Labour.

[Ginger Yellow]

I find it hard to get worked up about individual amendment votes now. The time to vote against hard Brexit was the article 50 vote.

[Tubby Isaacs]

The Norwegian government would love to join the EU, but their people rejected it in a referendum.

So Norway has a "deal" whereby they pay membership fees and are a part of Schengen, and in return they can access the single market. All with no say as to what goes on in Brussels.

Yeah, I know. Chuck in something a bit stronger than what Switzerland "negotiated" on freedom of movement. What else are we going to get?

Corbyn can pose with some fishermen, seeing they're apparently the most important group of workers in the country.

[Tubby Isaacs]

I find it hard to get worked up about individual amendment votes now. The time to vote against hard Brexit was the article 50 vote.

It's 3D chess, with clever Metropolitan Keir keeping people like me onside, while the bastard son of Tony Benn and Caroline Flint is driving policy.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Did I miss the discussion on here of Corbyn whipping Labour to vote with the Tories on leaving the single market?

https://www.politicshome.com/news/uk...te-quit-single

I cannot find words to express how much I despise both the Tories and the Corbyn wing of Labour.

Well, obviously I'd support being in the EEA, as would everyone here. I suppose there's a case for letting the Tories own the mess for a while longer.

I blow hot and cold on believing in an imminent shift. But blowing more cold.

[Etienne]

I don't know enough to judge between the two sides, but Barry Gardiner's explanation seemed plausible:

Amendment would have stopped Treasury from applying any tariffs or quotas to goods in or out of EU after Brexit. It did NOT keep us in Customs Union as EU could still impose tariffs on us!
WTO’s ‘most favoured nation’ rule says unless you have a specific trade agreement you must give all countries the same tariff & quota deal as you give the most favoured.
So if you can’t give tariffs to EU you can’t to anyone else either!
So amendment would mean:
i)Under No Deal the U.K. could not impose ANY tariffs or quotas.
ii)even if we had a Customs Union Agreement with the EU but had a dispute over dumping we would not be able to impose any countervailing tariff to defend our industry
Hope that helps!

[Lang Spoon]

It being Ian Murray’s amendment makes me predisposed toward half-believing Gardiner’s explanation. Laughing like fuck now Murray is outnumbered in WM by wee Scotch Corbies and he has lost Dugdale as his hotline to Holyrood. He’s Sunset Boulevard yesterday’s news.

But still, where were Labour’s amendments on the single market? Stephen Bush explains pretty well why Labour are being cunts on Brexit, but it still seems mad short-termist, and dare I say it, against the National Interest. Maybe listening to the fucked shit towns of Britain before this madness would have helped, instead of parachuting spads to Burnley etc. But now they listen to their Legitimate Concerns. When they are spraying piss waywardly at the wrong target ffs. Labour left and right in England are guilty of that. There will be no fucking money for the mildest social democracy with Hard Brexit or no deal hell.

Surely Two Brains Starmer knows this? Long game or just the equally useless slightly left of centre mirror of David Willets?

[ad hoc]

I thought this was an interesting longer piece on Ireland and the border and what is going on at the moment. I have no idea whether it's mostly true but it seems to fit together https://www.rte.ie/news/analysis-and...g-read-brexit/

[Snake Plissken]

There is a clip of Starmer talking about the way the result has been interpreted on Channel 4 News Facebook page.

https://www.facebook.com/Channel4New...1473891930549/

[Nefertiti2]

Peter Geoghegan who IMO has been excellent on Brexit and exposed a lot of the dodgy payments has been commenting on Brexit and that the British don't seem to take Ireland or Irish concerns seriously as evidenced by this very odd piece by Laura Kuennssberg

I guess in the Brexiteers' vision of the post-Brexit world Ireland will, like the rest of the colonies, be happy to come back where it belongs.

I also wonder what the involvement of the Secret Service have been. Journalists who have been close to MI5, like Andrew Neil, seem also very enthusiastic about Brexit.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

That Labour amendment was silly. It buys into the brexiter idea that the single market can be replicated by not having any tariffs, and that's really not how it works.

[Ginger Yellow]

Today in weird Brexit headlines in the financial press: UK warned of diminished role in regulating EU finance.

If by diminished you mean "no", sure. It doesn't matter where the HQ is. It matters that we're not in the fucking EU.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

That Kuenssberg article is absolute fucking lunacy. If a Fine Gael Govt is saying or doing something about the north you have to bear in mind that this is the bare fucking minimum required, and also probably inadequate.

[Snake Plissken]

Kuenssberg is the Garth Crooks of political pundits.

[Nefertiti2]

Charles Grant From the Centre for European reform

"My take-away from a day of meetings in Brussels: The issue of the Irish border is much more likely to scupper a deal on Brexit in December than money or citizens' rights. 'There is no solution that can satisfy IRE and UK', says one EU ambassador." @CER_EU

[Nefertiti2]

Meanwhile Andrew Neil is continuing to push his "Germany on the edge" narrative and issued a lot of Trumpian tweets in the night with dark hints at traitorous behaviour.

"nce the German political crisis started to unfold I’ve been inundated by tweets saying there is no crisis and that the UK is rubbish. I wonder why that is?"

'Yes. I belatedly get the party line. Whatever happens in Germany is brilliant. Whatever happens in Blighty is crap. Apologies for being a slow learner. '

'Latest polls have CDU and SPD weakening since election. Might not mean much. But you are symptomatic of a trend on my Twitter feed that mitigates German problems and relishes British ones. I wonder why.'

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

This is the front page of the daily Express. Do they have any readers under 70?