Current Affairs EU In or Out

[Bruce Wayne]

I look forward to vaulting this on a daily basis, should Labour get back into power

Ha, I'll undoubtedly moan, but won't go as far as to suggest they're somehow an affront to democracy as they butcher the liberal traditions I hold dear

 

[peteblue]

What’s your favourite part of a no deal?

Just walking away from the EU......

 

[zzr45]

ive been driving HGV lorries mush. so on a second by second basis

It’s superb when people can’t keep their stories straight...

 

[abelard]

Ha, I'll undoubtedly moan, but won't go as far as to suggest they're somehow an affront to democracy as they butcher the liberal traditions I hold dear

I'm expecting a lot of 'championing of unelected corporations' too

 

[Bruce Wayne]

I'm expecting a lot of 'championing of unelected corporations' too

They're elected by all the customers they serve, every time they're served

 

[Mozza1987]

The main issue from the start was a huge amount of people who voted leave didn't actually know what they were voting for especially with both campaigns not telling the truth half of the time. This is why now people know what they will be getting and what it will look like some will have changed their mind. If the campaigns were honest from the start then there would be no need for another referendum but how do we honestly know what the people want now over 3 years on? Saying the EU election shows this is rubbish as well as if you added up the votes for the more remain parties to the leave parties then you could argue there were more votes saying we should stay even though the Brexit Party did do extremely well.

No deal would be horrendous in my opinion and should be avoided at all costs. Even though I voted to remain, I am happy if we left with a good deal but if they can't agree and we don't want no deal then how else do you move on unless you have another referendum with all the options open to the people?

 

[dead_soft]

Just walking away from the EU......

That’s a fairly odd thing, you must understand that?

 

[degsy]

Did you go to the Alanis Morrisette school of understanding irony? Butchery of the English language aside, the very act of democracy is a continuous and ongoing debate about issues. Indeed, that's the whole point of our parliamentary system. It isn't to give whoever won the last general election a dictatorship for the next 5 years. It's a shame that such staunch defenders of democracy don't appear to have a clue what democracy actually means.

What's more, it's perhaps telling that the Founding Fathers expressly created an unelected second chamber to hedge against mob rule, and this regulatory presence is a central part of any functioning democracy, yet that too is something Farage and his cronies wish to do away with because they dare to shine the light of reason on their mad fantasies. There have been similar attacks on the free judiciary and press, which are, again, bedrocks of a functioning democracy.

So Brexiters championing democracy really is ironic as in reality you want to destroy it.

The whole point of democracy is the vote is the vote is the result.
Just as in any vote be it PoP, GE, EMP or House of Commons vote, once the numbers are counted, its first past the post and the ayes have it.
Any 'dressed up in new words' 2nd Referendum (aka trying to change the 1st result) is just crying to get your own way as you didn't like the result.
Whatever Democracy is - its not this - the vote is the vote is the result.

 

[Barnfred 55]

And I mean in concrete terms. I DGAF about sovereignty or pride in my country or anything like that.

Have you ever given it a thought that there may be a lot of people in this country who do care about those things.

What gives you the right to dictate to those people what they do and don't care about?

 

[JammyP]

Blue passports though!!

(Like they have in Italy - Maroon is not an EU requirement)

 

[Bruce Wayne]

The whole point of democracy is the vote is the vote is the result.
Just as in any vote be it PoP, GE, EMP or House of Commons vote, once the numbers are counted, its first past the post and the ayes have it.
Any 'dressed up in new words' 2nd Referendum (aka trying to change the 1st result) is just crying to get your own way as you didn't like the result.
Whatever Democracy is - its not this - the vote is the vote is the result.

Come again? The Cameron government was in office for approximately 1 year before a general election was called because circumstances had markedly changed and an election was deemed the best way to secure the democratic mandate required to proceed. You could argue the toss over that, but all this whinging about democracy wasn't happening then, so why now? It's almost like you feel you stole a result that will have an impact on British life for a generation, and are terrified that you wouldn't be able to steal it a second time.

 

[Brisan123]

It's harder to find anything good going for the brexit crowd though, if at all.

You'd think Farage would've spent his money on some pie charts or something showing us the promise land

All his money is going on dry cleaning

 

[Barnfred 55]

The main issue from the start was a huge amount of people who voted leave didn't actually know what they were voting for especially with both campaigns not telling the truth half of the time. This is why now people know what they will be getting and what it will look like some will have changed their mind. If the campaigns were honest from the start then there would be no need for another referendum but how do we honestly know what the people want now over 3 years on? Saying the EU election shows this is rubbish as well as if you added up the votes for the more remain parties to the leave parties then you could argue there were more votes saying we should stay even though the Brexit Party did do extremely well.

No deal would be horrendous in my opinion and should be avoided at all costs. Even though I voted to remain, I am happy if we left with a good deal but if they can't agree and we don't want no deal then how else do you move on unless you have another referendum with all the options open to the people?

Good post mate. You put forward a decent argument. I have a number of issues with a second referendum. Firstly is the question that is asked. The only question that is truly democratic and engages the whole of the electorate is a straightforward Leave or Remain. But most remain supporters would rightly argue that there are different versions of Brexit. But any other question would either split or completely alienate large sections of the leave vote, ensuring an easy victory for Remain. Anybody who believes that is fair has a strange understanding of democracy.

My second issue is that a second referendum, like it or not, will set a precedent and the losing side can easily make a very good argument for a third, fourth, where do you stop?

I fully agree with you that a no deal Brexit would be very hard on the country, both economically and logistically. It would of course also be very hard on the EU, some countries more than others. So a deal would be the best way forward. The current deal is dead, I think that's fair to say. So the only way a new deal can be agreed is if the EU agree to re-open negotiations, something they have so far refused to do.

Personally I believe the biggest stumbling block to an agreement is not the withdrawal agreement itself, but the EU's insistence that the WA is signed before they will discuss the future arrangements. For me, the two go hand in hand. When May tried to pass the WA on its own, it failed badly. This was not down to the backstop which only had possibly a 100 dissenters. No the majority voted against it because they had no idea what the future would look like, and who can blame them.

So if the EU agree to negotiate both the future relationship and the withdrawal agreement alongside each, I can see an end to this and it would certainly do away with the need for a backstop. It would likely involve the UK staying part of the EU until the end of next year at least, but I believe it's worth it if we can bring an end to this mess. It's certainly better than a no deal Brexit.

 

[degsy]

Come again? The Cameron government was in office for approximately 1 year before a general election was called because circumstances had markedly changed and an election was deemed the best way to secure the democratic mandate required to proceed. You could argue the toss over that, but all this whinging about democracy wasn't happening then, so why now? It's almost like you feel you stole a result that will have an impact on British life for a generation, and are terrified that you wouldn't be able to steal it a second time.

This is not about Cameron or anything else bar Remain or Leave.
Dodge around it all you like. The vote was leave.
Unless this new Referendum is about the hows and whens of when we leave it's just another way to get the result reversed. To have the leave result over turned via another vote, because those who wanted to remain basically didn't turn out to vote as they though it was a forgone conclusion...(just like your man mentioned above)

" Democracy basically means do what we want or we'll cry"...and get the result changed because we didn't
like it.
That is not Democracy, its whatever the UK equivalent of Banana Republic is...

 

[Bruce Wayne]

This is not about Cameron or anything else bar Remain or Leave.
Dodge around it all you like. The vote was leave.
Unless this new Referendum is about the hows and whens of when we leave it's just another way to get the result reversed. To have the leave result over turned via another vote, because those who wanted to remain basically didn't turn out to vote as they though it was a forgone conclusion...(just like your man mentioned above)

" Democracy basically means do what we want or we'll cry"...and get the result changed because we didn't
like it.
That is not Democracy, its whatever the UK equivalent of Banana Republic is...

Even if we have 100 referenda, nothing will change unless people change their mind. Are they not allowed to do that in your democratic wonderland?