Brexit - UK negotiates a deal

[Jimbob]

The saying "You'll vote, and keep voting until we get the right answer" gives meaning after yesterdays vote.

I'm pretty much sick of Brexit now, either we'll extend Article 50, withdraw it or leave with No Deal.  If we extend or withdraw, there will most certainly be a General Election to follow.  The Tories don't know which end their heads are these days.

[Pestneb]

Yeah.. tbh I really don't see the point of "leaving the EU" but remaining in the single market, what "benefits" would that bring? No deal has "able to make own deals and we are accountable to ourselves" and No brexit has the advantage of the status quo, but surely the single market option corbyn likes (at least the only way the EU would be happy to agree to) would basically just be "in the EU but without as much sway". Seems a bit like leaving the room.. but standing in the doorway?

As I see it 100% brexit or 100% EU are the only options that make any sort of sense to me, both have positives and negatives but the route May seems to be taken only seems to have negatives

[sumo73]

1 hour ago, Jimbob said:

The saying "You'll vote, and keep voting until we get the right answer" gives meaning after yesterdays vote.

I'm pretty much sick of Brexit now, either we'll extend Article 50, withdraw it or leave with No Deal.  If we extend or withdraw, there will most certainly be a General Election to follow.  The Tories don't know which end their heads are these days.

Never heard of that saying but you can't keep doing the same thing expecting different results. I believe Albert Einstein had a saying similar to this.

Ireland voted on the Lisburn treaty and were asked to vote again until 'we get the right answer'.

I see politicians now voting more on what they think they should do rather than voting on what their constituencies think regardless of how ever virtuous/good willed a MP's intentions were or are now.

If there is a general election this year it can't be with May in charge as the Conservatives will have no hope. May has damaged her own reputation and her parties reputation. I'm not a Conservative but the party is supposed to be about tradition, family and law and order. I don't see any of that now. She has a difficult job right now but her party is in a mess. Labour look in a better position but that's not saying much.

Edited March 13, 2019 by sumo73

[Glen-i]

I think I'll need to upgrade my "Silly Escapist Game" from Hyrule Warriors to Tokyo Mirage Sessions for tonight's vote.

To be honest, I'm a little scared.

[gaggle64]

It's legit baffling to me that May isn't whipping/doing more to tell her MPs to vote to take No-Deal off the table even after finally FINALLY admitting out loud what shitstorm no-deal would be - if it isn't ruled out after tonight's vote I might lose my mind.

Difficult to tell if the EU would even grant us an extension without immediately presenting an alternate way forward at this point - revoking Article 50 and starting over could be the only realistic way forward but I can't imagine the PM being that brave or sensible even now that she has nothing left to lose. 

Edited March 13, 2019 by gaggle64

[Kav]

No Deal has been voted down, with a majority of 4. May didn’t whip a particular way as she didn’t want to have to then deal with firing ministers and all it entails.

Tomorrow the vote to extend Article 50!

I think the EU would only agree to extend if there’s another Referendum or an Election.

Tories might prefer to try and fight an election given  that calling a 2nd Referendum would risk splitting the Party & their voters again.

[Jimbob]

Oh boy, here we go.

The only way the EU will extend will be if there's a 2nd referendum or an election as you said @Kav.  Going to be an interesting 24 hours again.

[bob]

No Deal has been voted down, with a majority of 4. May didn’t whip a particular way as she didn’t want to have to then deal with firing ministers and all it entails.
Tomorrow the vote to extend Article 50!
I think the EU would only agree to extend if there’s another Referendum or an Election.
Tories might prefer to try and fight an election given  that calling a 2nd Referendum would risk splitting the Party & their voters again.

The vote to the amendment was lost by 4. The actual vote against No Deal was lost by 43.

Same outcome though.

[Dcubed]

Doubt that the EU would consider a general election to be a valid reason for extending Article 50 though... Our lack of effective governance is our problem, not theirs...

 

... and if that's the case... then two weeks really isn't long enough for a GE to take place...

[Kav]

53 minutes ago, bob said:

The vote to the amendment was lost by 4. The actual vote against No Deal was lost by 43.

Same outcome though.

Yeah, just read it properly (was on a packed tram before).

Chaos in Parliament! May has absolutely no authority.

Edited March 13, 2019 by Kav

[Kav]

19 minutes ago, Dcubed said:

Doubt that the EU would consider a general election to be a valid reason for extending Article 50 though... Our lack of effective governance is our problem, not theirs...

 

... and if that's the case... then two weeks really isn't long enough for a GE to take place...

You need less time for an Election than you do a Referendum though.

[Dcubed]

1 minute ago, Kav said:

You need less time for an Election than you do a Referendum though.

They'd definitely consider a second referendum to be a valid reason for extension; I'm not so confident on them feeling the same way about a GE though...

[Kav]

2 minutes ago, Dcubed said:

They'd definitely consider a second referendum to be a valid reason for extension; I'm not so confident on them feeling the same way about a GE though...

It depends if they were to see it as a way of a Government getting a majority and therefore a mandate.

I’d imagine the Parties would put a new Referendum in their manifestos, that’s how an agreement to an extension would be sold too.

[Dcubed]

5 minutes ago, Kav said:

It depends if they were to see it as a way of a Government getting a majority and therefore a mandate.

I’d imagine the Parties would put a new Referendum in their manifestos, that’s how an agreement to an extension would be sold too.

True, they could sell it like that to the EU, but I dunno if they'd buy it...

 

As for parties including it in their manifestos? Outside of the Lib Dems? I doubt they would... It's too risky.  They could be potentially cutting off a whole half of their potential voter base by doing so.

[Aperson]

This is going exactly like I expected it to so far. Can now see the government asking for an extension of Brexit. It pretty much means that the EU will decide our country's fate instead of the government, because the government has shown that they cannot do it themselves.

[Fierce_LiNk]

Why do I get the impression that these MPs just enjoy voting over stuff (and opposing things) rather than actually getting something done. Nothing has really been sorted out from tonight's votes. Eventually, these politicians are going to have to agree on something or there will definitely be No Deal...no matter how much they claim that they don't want it.

Also, all of this talk about a deal...there doesn't seem to be any current consensus about what this sort of deal should include. Labour and the Conservatives both want a Customs Union, and the Conservatives came back with a proposal for one, which Labour seemingly hated and voted against. So...we're just not making progress and I don't see what an extension will solve. It's almost worth withdrawing Article 50 and starting again. 

Or, you know, they could just come clean and state that they've tried and failed and the best possible deal is the one that we have. It just seems really silly to go through all of these negotiations, to waste all of this time, and to try to get something really close to what we currently have....when we could just quite literally keep what we already have. I still question why we are negotiating (and spending years doing so) to get worse than what we already have. 

 

[Kav]

 

Edited March 14, 2019 by Kav

[Ashley]

19 hours ago, Fierce_LiNk said:

Why do I get the impression that these MPs just enjoy voting over stuff (and opposing things) rather than actually getting something done. Nothing has really been sorted out from tonight's votes. Eventually, these politicians are going to have to agree on something or there will definitely be No Deal...no matter how much they claim that they don't want it.

It's amazing how MPs can't decide what Brexit means but apparently the public knew exactly years ago...

[Kav]

So the UK is asking the EU for an extension to Article 50.

Only a Peoples Vote on the Deal/Remain or a General Election would get the EU to agree surely?

[Fierce_LiNk]

3 hours ago, Ashley said:

It's amazing how MPs can't decide what Brexit means but apparently the public knew exactly years ago...

I also love how May is allowed to have multiple attempts at her deal, with the only real change being that she has bolded a few words, used a bit of word art here and there, and changed the font from Arial to Tahoma, whilst we're only allowed to only have one say despite being in a much better position now to make a more informed decision regarding the situation.

1 hour ago, Kav said:

So the UK is asking the EU for an extension to Article 50.

Only a Peoples Vote on the Deal/Remain or a General Election would get the EU to agree surely?

They may grant us a short extension if they feel that May can finally get her deal through. Any longer than that though and we've then got the issue of the European elections. 

[bob]

They may grant us a short extension if they feel that May can finally get her deal through. Any longer than that though and we've then got the issue of the European elections. 

These unelected elitist bureaucrats with their elections!

[Grazza]

On ‎13‎/‎03‎/‎2019 at 3:05 PM, Pestneb said:

Yeah.. tbh I really don't see the point of "leaving the EU" but remaining in the single market, what "benefits" would that bring? No deal has "able to make own deals and we are accountable to ourselves" and No brexit has the advantage of the status quo, but surely the single market option corbyn likes (at least the only way the EU would be happy to agree to) would basically just be "in the EU but without as much sway". Seems a bit like leaving the room.. but standing in the doorway?

As I see it 100% brexit or 100% EU are the only options that make any sort of sense to me, both have positives and negatives but the route May seems to be taken only seems to have negatives

 

Well, the thing that's causing all this strain at the moment is the Irish backstop.  Norway Plus totally, utterly fixes that - no border, no backstop.  I admit it is a very soft Brexit indeed, but I'd see it as similar to Scottish or Welsh devolution.  We'd have full control over any laws that don't relate to trade, and we'd also be exempt from ever-closer union, which I'm sure is one of people's biggest concerns.  If we'd pursued this all along, businesses would have been fully reassured.

 

I don't think there are many countries who totally object to the EU, but some of us believe in an inner core and outer circle.  Whichever option we choose, it should be one that keeps trade alignment between both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, and Northern Ireland and Great Britain.  Norway Plus and Remain are the only two options that do that, and (in my opinion) the only two that should ever have been on the table.

[sumo73]

2 hours ago, Grazza said:

I don't think there are many countries who totally object to the EU, but some of us believe in an inner core and outer circle.  Whichever option we choose, it should be one that keeps trade alignment between both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, and Northern Ireland and Great Britain.  Norway Plus and Remain are the only two options that do that, and (in my opinion) the only two that should ever have been on the table.

I am not going to argue any points here but it's worth having a look at this article -

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/jan/20/norway-plus-uk-brexit-not-silver-bullet

[Pestneb]

There are things the Norway plus doesn't deal with, it is, imo, a dumb choice, taking the worst parts of a hard brexit and losing the main benefits of remaining. 

It's very understandable the EU wants the UK to remain at least in some form (I understand the UK is currently the second largest net contributor to the project?) and that is why they refused to discuss trade with May prior to this agreement going through - it makes a huge issue of the N.I border, and also makes the value of the 40M "divorce fee" unclear - if the trade deal we get is as bad as no deal for example, probably very poor value for money.

I'm not too fussed with either option (Brexit or remain), I just feel that in should be in, out should be out, hanging in the doorway just seems awkward and indecisive. I don't believe there is a good option any more either, it's been dragged out too long, began too political, became even more political, and frankly I don't think Brexit means Brexit at all any more, it seems to me that it simply means "to bicker".

I just read Sumo's link, so yeah, what that guy said on Norway.

Edited March 15, 2019 by Pestneb

[Kav]

Bercow has just blocked Meaningful Vote 3, unless it has substantial change within it!