Brexit

[gaggedLouise]

The early exit polls turned out to have got it right, and Britain is in for the most decisive (or worst) right-wing turn since the days of Thatcher. It really is hard to take that so many people were conned by BoJo and his elusive, fake chumminess and vague, misleading or overbold statements - or downright falsehoods.  :-(

Of course much will depend on what direction Boris will take when he has such a big, safe majority. Some are speculating that he would turn towards the centre and go for a more moderate Brexit, now that he'll have a good deal of new tory MPs coming from blue-collar districts where people used to vote Labour. I am sceptical - his core following has long  been among the hard Brexiteers and he'll want to keep their loyalty and make them feel gratified, so presumably he's going to stick with the vcisions of a hard or nearly-hard Brexit, a stripping down of all kinds of EU-based legislation and a more Trumpian economy. The very kind of policies that will help make Britain rift apart even further.  :-(

[Humble Scribe]

I don't think it's a question of people being convinced by Boris - I don't sense a lot of affection for him, even outside my liberal metropolitan bubble. More I think it's that no-one else convinced them either - a combination of Brexit fatigue with an uninspiring Labour leader who has tacked too far left, over-promised and who people simply don't believe can deliver. Plus Boris has had to promise a big spending spree of his own and an end to austerity, which if he doesn't deliver will lose him all the seats in the north he has just gained. So we're broadly looking at an economically liberal, socially conservative government - almost the opposite of David Cameron's coalition.

The result gives him far more leeway on Brexit - this is the result Theresa May hoped for in 2017, so that she wouldn't be held hostage by the right wing of her party. Remember that the current 'deal' is only the withdrawal agreement, and aside from the Irish question, it's essentially the same one May negotiated. The discussions about the future trading relationship are what comes next, and now there is more room for manouevre, you might find that the end result is more sensible than it would otherwise have been. I still believe that for Boris (not the Brexit Party, admittedly), No Deal was only ever a negotiating pose to try and get concessions out of the EU - a giant game of chicken. At least, that's the crumbs of cold comfort I'm trying to draw from this. Otherwise it's a depressing five - and maybe ten - years ahead.

[HairyHeretic]

What I'm curious about now is if Scotland will go independent and seek to stay within the EU. From what I saw of the results the SNP made significant gains.

[Azuresun]

The result gives him far more leeway on Brexit - this is the result Theresa May hoped for in 2017, so that she wouldn't be held hostage by the right wing of her party. Remember that the current 'deal' is only the withdrawal agreement, and aside from the Irish question, it's essentially the same one May negotiated. The discussions about the future trading relationship are what comes next, and now there is more room for manouevre, you might find that the end result is more sensible than it would otherwise have been. I still believe that for Boris (not the Brexit Party, admittedly), No Deal was only ever a negotiating pose to try and get concessions out of the EU - a giant game of chicken. At least, that's the crumbs of cold comfort I'm trying to draw from this. Otherwise it's a depressing five - and maybe ten - years ahead.

Nothing about Johnson makes me think he's anything other than one of the hard-liners himself, who actually believes all the posturing and overblown Express-headline-bait rhetoric. The impression I get is that he sees himself as the next Winston Churchill.

My own hunch was that it wasn't so much that Johnson won, but more that Corbyn lost. I don't even think it was that he was too left-wing (the attack dog papers of the right had been equally savage and hateful in going after the extremely mild and inoffensive Milliband), more that he just never came across as having a particularly strong message of his own other than "Trump's going to sell your NHS!"*, and kept needlessly handing over ammunition for the ZOMGMARXISM narrative. Still, he'll be gone within the week.

At this point (when I, admittedly, am depressed and pissed off), part of me wants them to just get Brexit done one way or another--because maybe if it's out the way, more voters will lose their single-issue tunnel vision and realise how many other problems the Conservatives have failed to address. For the last few years, they've been able to reliably energise the base with bombastic talk about The Will Of (52% of) The People, while Labour have flopped around without a strong stance.


* Which won't happen--at least not all at once. It'll go bit by plausibly deniable bit.

[gaggedLouise]

What I'm curious about now is if Scotland will go independent and seek to stay within the EU. From what I saw of the results the SNP made significant gains.

Most likely it would take several years for them to get a referendum and leave the UK and a couple more years to get to join the EU. They don't really seem to have any good pushing points to force the other into an agreement over either one, and it usually does take a couple of years to negotiate entry into the EU. Especially if it's one country by itself. The Eastern European countries were fast-tracked because they were many, they had some clout together and the EU wanted to expand to the east: with Scotland, sadly there would be none of those speeding-up motives for the EU.

[TheGlyphstone]

Most likely it would take several years for them to get a referendum and leave the UK and a couple more years to get to join the EU. They don't really seem to have any good pushing points to force the other into an agreement over either one, and it usually does take a couple of years to negotiate entry into the EU. Especially if it's one country by itself. The Eastern European countries were fast-tracked because they were many, they had some clout together and the EU wanted to expand to the east: with Scotland, sadly there would be none of those speeding-up motives for the EU.

Spite for Britain?

[Eye of Horus]

Whooo boy, there's a lot to unpack since last Friday, isn't there?

Nothing about Johnson makes me think he's anything other than one of the hard-liners himself, who actually believes all the posturing and overblown Express-headline-bait rhetoric.

Correct. Johnson's views and, tellingly, those of pretty much everyone he has deigned to promote to a cabinet position, are very much of the Rule Britannia, dissent-intolerant, free market fundamentalist type.

My own hunch was that it wasn't so much that Johnson won, but more that Corbyn lost. I don't even think it was that he was too left-wing (the attack dog papers of the right had been equally savage and hateful in going after the extremely mild and inoffensive Milliband), more that he just never came across as having a particularly strong message of his own other than "Trump's going to sell your NHS!"*, and kept needlessly handing over ammunition for the ZOMGMARXISM narrative.

I agree that there wasn't much wrong with the left wing policy platform, per se. Most of the policies individually have widespread support, and Labour remains ahead of the Tories among all voter groups below age 50. There's also the fact that the centrist Lib Dems got all but annihilated, while even the Tories had to at least pretend that they were ditching austerity and were going to start funding public services with impressive sums of money (still well below what is actually needed, but hey ho). If nothing else, Labour have managed to shift the conversation around the economy, and with any luck that's not going to simply disappear.

There's definitely some truth to the idea that "Johnson didn't win but Corbyn lost", since the Tory vote didn't increase by all that much, while Labour's collapsed by over 2 million - from what I can see there were three main factors to it:

Brexit - Labour were uniquely screwed by the Leave vote and, more importantly, its distribution across the UK. Not following the meaningless but digestible line of "leave means leave!" cost them votes in run-down northern towns, but by not coming out for Remain they risked losing about three times as many votes from their city constituencies. The compromise of going for a deal but putting it to a referendum was really the only path that stood any chance of working at all, and in the end it didn't work. Farage acting as Johnson's patsy to split the Leave vote in non-Tory constituencies (proving, once again, that any party he leads is nothing more than a Tory Trojan horse) did the rest.

"I don't like Corbyn" - four years of relentless media smears didn't just go away. Of course, the more time people spend listening to Corbyn himself rather than news articles about him, the more they tend to like him; converse to Johnson, who becomes less likeable the more you get to know him. This might explain why the Tory campaign managers, much like May's, kept him out of as many interviews and debates as possible, and kept broadcasts of his public appearances to stage-managed events. They were banking on framing an election of parties as a presidential election between Johnson and Corbyn, and that their cheerleaders in the media would do the rest. Unlike for May, it paid off this time.

Credibility - While I said previously that Labour's policies were (are) popular, they didn't have a simple, meme-able slogan around their economic strategy. Not to say that "voters are dumb", but most people weren't taught anything about economics in school (and hence, why history shows that investment is better than austerity, and why government borrowing isn't like a credit card, and why a "magic money tree" is essentially how every bank and government operates). Moreover, most voters aren't sufficiently interested in politics to go and research it. If Labour had picked an easily digestible slogan such as "invest now for future prosperity" or "you wouldn't cut a business to grow it" then maybe fewer people would have dismissed Labour's pledges as fantasy on the same level as the Tories' 50,000 nurses. It's kind of a sad fact that rational, nuanced narratives (Corbyn's signature style) usually lose out to simplistic emotive bullshit (Johnson's speciality), but other than making basic macroeconomics part of the standard curriculum in high schools, this is probably the only way to destroy the pervasive myth that the Tories are and always have been more economically competent than Labour.

A fourth factor which played massively into the Tories' hands was, as ever, a criminally one-sided media. They have now been joined de facto (albeit perhaps not intentionally) by Facebook, who after seeing independent pro-Labour pages go viral in 2017 decided that people should pay for that privilege and rewrote their algorithms so that shared posts will only reach people already interested in them unless the originator pays a fee. This obviously benefited the deep-pocketed Tory party, whereas left-wing independents saw their organic reach reduced to something like 5% of what they had previously, and left them largely preaching to a choir of already pro-Labour voters. I'm not sure if Labour put a lot of money into online adverts this campaign or if they simply assumed that their army of independent volunteers would do the work for them, but if it was the latter it would seem like a pretty disastrous oversight.

And, lest we focus too much on Labour, the Tories did run an absolutely criminal campaign this election, with all the hallmarks of Johnson and Cummings' fetid Leave circus. From a barrage of egregious lies (88%, according to the BBC) that came too thick and fast for fact-checkers to refute them all, to the bogus anti-establishment framing, to dead-cat-on-the-table stunts like CCHQ's "fact check" renaming and the fake Labour manifesto link, to the notionally independent splinter group that mounted a last-minute and totally illegal poster campaign around polling stations, to god knows how much money poured into Google search priority and a swathe of targeted online ads, this had Cummings' amoral claw marks all over it. I have to say, if I had known at the time that Dom Cummings was an authoritarian nutcase with an unhealthy obsession with Otto von Bismarck, I would have slammed this year's Brexit: The Uncivil War for portraying him as just some quirky Anarchist Sherlock.

At this point (when I, admittedly, am depressed and pissed off), part of me wants them to just get Brexit done one way or another--because maybe if it's out the way, more voters will lose their single-issue tunnel vision and realise how many other problems the Conservatives have failed to address.

Sadly, I don't think that will be the case. While I had my doubts about Labour's line of "done in six months since we'll retain most of our existing trade agreements", the number of people coming out and saying that, actually, this trade talks malarky is going to go on for years after the withdrawal agreement is signed in January, has been steadily multiplying. The worst part is that it will take up a good chunk of government resources, and the Tories will no doubt spin that once again as an excuse for why they continue to neglect everything else.

I doubt we've seen the last of the odious Nigel Farage either, given that Cummings boasted that he'd killed UKIP with the Leave vote in 2016, and he still bobbed up like the shit that won't flush, carrying on with his mission of pulling the Conservative party ever further into the extreme right. I sometimes wish that Farage could be charged with treason, given that he's done immeasurably more damage to our prosperity and security than any immigrant ever will, though I'd settle for jailing him for insider trading after he helped his stockbroker mates short the £ on the night of the 2016 referendum.

[Eye of Horus]

I'll make this a separate post since it deals with Scotland, whereas my previous reply concerned the recent election result more generally.

Most likely it would take several years for them to get a referendum and leave the UK and a couple more years to get to join the EU. They don't really seem to have any good pushing points to force the other into an agreement over either one, and it usually does take a couple of years to negotiate entry into the EU. Especially if it's one country by itself. The Eastern European countries were fast-tracked because they were many, they had some clout together and the EU wanted to expand to the east: with Scotland, sadly there would be none of those speeding-up motives for the EU.

From a former EU council president to a number of MEPs, the EU are now rather sympathetic to Scotland's desire to rejoin. And well they might be - the UK electing to leave was a big prestige and propaganda blow to them; Scotland trying so hard to rejoin is a definite win in return.

There are certainly issues to iron out, such as how much the UK might diverge from EU law before Scotland (hypothetically) leaves, whether the national debt can be brought down to requirements (or waived), and whether the ten-year-independent-currency rule can be waived, but the political will is there - and in general, the EU have often bent over backwards to make sure they can't be painted as obstructive "bad guys" (c.f. how accommodating they were in the Brexit talks with May, and later with Johnson).

Spite for Britain?

No more than the English vote to leave the EU was driven by spite for Europe, I imagine.

Where this goes will be very interesting. For one thing, while (ironically) nothing would have poleaxed Sturgeon's case for independence like a Labour government offering massive investment for Scotland coupled with another EU referendum that could well have swung Remain, nothing is more likely to turbocharge the SNP's support now than another hated Tory government hell-bent on Hard Brexit. For another thing, there is literally no democratic case that the Tories can argue both for their own mandate to govern and to carry out Brexit, and against the SNP's mandate to govern in Holyrood and to support IndyRef2 and rejoining the EU. Manifesto pledges, Leave/Remain split, number of seats, vote share, sovereignty, trade deals, uncertainty over the exiting process...they're snookered on every possible front.

I seriously doubt that the Conservatives' simplistic promise of "No second Scottish referendum!" will be enough to resolve the issue.

[gaggedLouise]

Nothing about Johnson makes me think he's anything other than one of the hard-liners himself, who actually believes all the posturing and overblown Express-headline-bait rhetoric. The impression I get is that he sees himself as the next Winston Churchill.

My own hunch was that it wasn't so much that Johnson won, but more that Corbyn lost. I don't even think it was that he was too left-wing (the attack dog papers of the right had been equally savage and hateful in going after the extremely mild and inoffensive Milliband), more that he just never came across as having a particularly strong message of his own other than "Trump's going to sell your NHS!"*, and kept needlessly handing over ammunition for the ZOMGMARXISM narrative. Still, he'll be gone within the week.

At this point (when I, admittedly, am depressed and pissed off), part of me wants them to just get Brexit done one way or another--because maybe if it's out the way, more voters will lose their single-issue tunnel vision and realise how many other problems the Conservatives have failed to address. For the last few years, they've been able to reliably energise the base with bombastic talk about The Will Of (52% of) The People, while Labour have flopped around without a strong stance.


* Which won't happen--at least not all at once. It'll go bit by plausibly deniable bit.

Actually, just like Brother Trump, Boris didn't win a majority in the popular vote. Yes, Boris got the most votes for one party nationally, but he would not have got a majorioty of mandates if the UK had had a proportional voting system that made sure seats and numbers of votes being reasonably aligned. Only the FPTP /one-man constituency system gave him the win - in numbers of seats, Tories were practically equal to Labour and LibDem together (around 43.7% each side), and with SNP's 4% added the anti-Boris opposition would likely have secured a majority.

How much did the Tories increase in the number of votes in this "landslide win", compared to 2017? The answer is - 1.2% of the national vote. In most countries that's seen as completely mediocre, or even a disapppointment.  :P The LibDem actually went *up* by 4.2% but are still seen as losers and "out of step with the people". This is actually really interesting stuff... :)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_United_Kingdom_general_election#Full_results

[Mechelle]

Yes, one of the ironies is that, over the UK as a whole, most people voted for pro-European parties, but the Conservatives' win was taken as a mandate for Brexit, while, in Scotland most people voted for unionist parties, but the SNP's win is taken as mandate for independence. So much for the FPTP system!

When Johnson names his cabinet, that will be the best guide to his intentions. If he really intends to be a One Nation Conservative, he can demonstrate that by sacking the likes of Rees-Mogg, but we will see. The new MPs will also help determine the direction of the party. There is a theory that the new MPs from traditional Labour seats in the north wouldmoderate the Conservatives, but two of the new MPs (not from the north) have been accused of favouring anti-Semitic propaganda. On the other hand, the new MP for Wakefield is apparently the first openly gay Muslim elected in the world.

As for the Labour Party, they seem to be heading for a quick leadership election, which may benefit Rebecca Long-Bailey, seen as Corbyn's heir. Lisa Nandy, the Wigan MP has said that she is seriously considering running. IMHO, she would be excellent, as well as Jess Phillips, whom I mentioned earlier.

[Eye of Horus]

Actually, just like Brother Trump, Boris didn't win a majority in the popular vote. Yes, Boris got the most votes for one party nationally, but he would not have got a majorioty of mandates if the UK had had a proportional voting system that made sure seats and numbers of votes being reasonably aligned. Only the FPTP /one-man constituency system gave him the win - in numbers of seats, Tories were practically equal to Labour and LibDem together (around 43.7% each side), and with SNP's 4% added the anti-Boris opposition would likely have secured a majority.

It’s actually pretty rare for one party to get a majority of the popular vote in the UK, where we have at least three major parties (six, if you count the Greens and the Scottish / Welsh nationalists). But yes, our FPTP voting system is archaic and unrepresentative compared to what most other European parties do.

Don’t worry though - now the Conservatives have a majority, they can resurrect their plans for democratic change! Which involve redrawing the constituency boundaries to reduce the number of seats in cities, which tend not to vote for them. Yay.

There’s also their manifesto pledge to “reform” the judiciary to reduce its ability to hold the government to account, and I hate to think where that road will lead us.

[gaggedLouise]

It’s actually pretty rare for one party to get a majority of the popular vote in the UK, where we have at least three major parties (six, if you count the Greens and the Scottish / Welsh nationalists). But yes, our FPTP voting system is archaic and unrepresentative compared to what most other European parties do.

Don’t worry though - now the Conservatives have a majority, they can resurrect their plans for democratic change! Which involve redrawing the constituency boundaries to reduce the number of seats in cities, which tend not to vote for them. Yay.

There’s also their manifesto pledge to “reform” the judiciary to reduce its ability to hold the government to account, and I hate to think where that road will lead us.

They also pledged not to lift the ban on fox-hunting; this must have been an important election pulling promise, don't you agree? :D

[hamish1024]

I'm not convinced there has been an overwhelming surge in support behind Scottish independence, so I can't see it happening... yet.

Since Brexit will cause an actual barrier between NI and the rest of the UK, I can actually see Ireland reunifying first.

My gut instinct for the order of slow British collapse over the next ten years would be:

1. Ireland
2. Scotland
3. Gibraltar
4. Wales

Which is a shame, as I liked Britain, but there you go.

[legomaster00156]

I'm not convinced there has been an overwhelming surge in support behind Scottish independence, so I can't see it happening... yet.

Since Brexit will cause an actual barrier between NI and the rest of the UK, I can actually see Ireland reunifying first.

My gut instinct for the order of slow British collapse over the next ten years would be:

1. Ireland
2. Scotland
3. Gibraltar
4. Wales

Which is a shame, as I liked Britain, but there you go.

Didn't Wales also go for Brexit, though?

[Callie Del Noire]

I'm not convinced there has been an overwhelming surge in support behind Scottish independence, so I can't see it happening... yet.

Since Brexit will cause an actual barrier between NI and the rest of the UK, I can actually see Ireland reunifying first.

My gut instinct for the order of slow British collapse over the next ten years would be:

1. Ireland
2. Scotland
3. Gibraltar
4. Wales

Which is a shame, as I liked Britain, but there you go.

I see Ireland and Scotland going, but I think the UK will hold on to the Rock (Gibraltar) till the Heat Death of the universe. It has been a HUGE point of contention between them and Spain .. well forever. I know when I was based in Rota that it was a given we would not be allowed to go because you never could tell when the Kingdom of Spain would lock down the access to it.

Wales could happen, but unlike Scotland and NI, they voted along with England to exit the EU... not to say they didn’t have issues.

NO way do I see the unionists in NI allowing a unification with Ireland happening peaceably

[Humble Scribe]

My gut instinct for the order of slow British collapse over the next ten years would be:
1. Ireland
2. Scotland
3. Gibraltar
4. Wales

The only one of those I can see happening is Scotland. Ireland won't because the Irish Republic doesn't want to burden itself with a Loyalist insurgency in a newly acquired poor northern province, and what the fuck are the Welsh going to live on without EU and UK handouts? (About 20% of Welsh GDP comes from UK/EU fund transfers into Wales).

[gaggedLouise]

The only one of those I can see happening is Scotland. Ireland won't because the Irish Republic doesn't want to burden itself with a Loyalist insurgency in a newly acquired poor northern province, and what the fuck are the Welsh going to live on without EU and UK handouts? (About 20% of Welsh GDP comes from UK/EU fund transfers into Wales).

I agree, Wales would be going nowhere on their own.

[Mechelle]

It is quite noticeable how the Welsh speaking areas of Wales both support Plaid Cymru and voted to remain in the EU. The majority of Wales is English speaking, but Welsh can be heard in Wales much, much more frequently than Gaelic in Scotland. Plaid Cymru, although they have a very inclusive nationalism, have always struggled to make any real breakthrough in the English speaking areas.
The English speaking areas, like Wrexham, in the north east seem to have voted in a similar to some of the smaller "left behind" towns like Leigh in the north west of England, by voting against the pro-EU parties even if they are beneficiaries of the EU.
I am not quite sure what conclusion I am reaching, but would say that Wales is not a homogenous bloc, just as the north of England is not, despite any simplistic comments from the mainstream media.

[Oniya]

The majority of Wales is English speaking, but Welsh can be heard in Wales much, much more frequently than Gaelic in Scotland.

Back in the late '80s/early '90s, there was a good amount of push to keep the Welsh language 'alive'.  I went to a language lab up in Nant Gwrtheyrn for an 'international term' during my second year in college. (and amazingly, only got one letter wrong in spelling that from memory.)

[Callie Del Noire]

Back in the late '80s/early '90s, there was a good amount of push to keep the Welsh language 'alive'.  I went to a language lab up in Nant Gwrtheyrn for an 'international term' during my second year in college. (and amazingly, only got one letter wrong in spelling that from memory.)

Ireland and Scotland has similar issues.  When I lived in the Republic in the early 80s, I was the only one in the school not required to take it. Because by the time I got there the teacher said I’d never catch up. Master Palmer was a mean old coot but he did teach me to appreciate history and literature.  Wish I hadn’t lost the book of stuff by Patrick Pierce he gave me

[Orval Wintermute]

Mark Francois, the living definition of Gammon, is now calling for "bongs for Brexit". Even the people that want this ridiculous project to go ahead now think we'll all have to be stoned to get through it.

https://twitter.com/Channel4News/status/1215331755848355840

[Humble Scribe]

Given the nature of this thread, we probably also ought to mark the fact that today the EU Withdrawal Bill finally passed its third reading in the Commons, with a majority of 99. So barring some jiggery pokery by the Lords (which the Commons will immediately reverse next week), the Bill could be law within a week. It's finally happening.

As for living Toby Jug Mark Francois, presumably he's been at the other kind of bong recently...

[Orval Wintermute]

I think there is a court case next week challenging the legal validity of Johnson's Withdrawal Agreement, something to do with taxes and tariffs between Northern Ireland and the mainland.

[Mechelle]

Trying to take the conversation away from Mark Francois and his bongs, the government have a majority sufficient to amend any law which might oppose their plans if need be, so it will happen.

It's only the withdrawal bill, rather than Brexit itself, and Johnson has already said that people would be bored by details of negotiations, so I think we can expect everything to go quiet, apart from Johnson saying that everything is going stonkingly well, unless he is hiding in a fridge again.

[Humble Scribe]

You can't stop the bongs, Mechelle...