BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 07:47 AM

I always thought it was your Donuel and my Dick, Steve but it now seems you have a Donuel and a Dick. Commiserations

Sorry John. I can't help it at times :-D

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 08:02 AM

Nigel Farage, Jacob Rees-Mogg and Arlene Foster are all going into massive hissy fits because Ursula is meeting the King. Looks like someone's doing something right. :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 08:16 AM

you can't fool all the people all the time which is why Steve and Dave don't impress me as the sharpest knife in the drawer.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 08:31 AM

Just piss off out of this thread. I tried to turn it back to the topic and here you are having a nice little troll. Grow up.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 08:47 AM

Anyone who pisses The Haunted Pencil, Haddock Face, and Mrs Foster off is alright in my book.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Raggytash
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 08:54 AM

Would I be correct to say that the Liberal Party and the Liberal Democrats are two entirely separate entities?

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: DMcG
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 08:59 AM

You caught me out there, Raggytash! The history of the Liberal Part(ies) is complicated but I had naively assumed they were the same. However WIkipedia informs me:

The Liberal Party is a liberal political party in the United Kingdom that was founded in 1989 as a continuation of the original Liberal Party (founded in 1859) by former members who opposed its merger with the Social Democratic Party (SDP) to form the Liberal Democrats. The party holds eleven local council seats. The party promotes a hybrid of both classical and social liberal tendencies.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: The Sandman
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 09:28 AM

that is correct but effectively their policies are very similiar.the original liberal party do not have one single MP.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 09:35 AM

You'll need photo ID in order to vote in the council elections in May. The rules for what ID you'll need are much stricter for the young (mainly Labour: no university ID, no young person's travel card allowed) than for the elderly (mainly Tory: Oyster card and bus passes, fine, even out-of date passports...)

You can apply for "free" voter ID if you're one of the two million who probably haven't got the correct photo ID. Two issues there: first, it's only "free" if you discount the added bureaucracy of printing stuff off/postage/travelling to pick it up, etc. Oh, and the taxpayer will, of course, pick up the tab for this scheme. Second, the publicity has been next to nil. So far, only 21,000 out of that two million have applied.

Ostensibly, this scheme is to prevent voting fraud. Well, between 2010 and 2018, there were (wait for it...) TWO convictions for voter fraud. As someone in a below-the-line comment in the Guardian pointed out, far more Tory MPs than that are charged with sexual assault...

Of course, the real point of the scheme is to make it harder for poorer people to vote Labour. Democracy at its best!

If this shambles of a government really wanted just to tighten up the voting system, they could ask voters to turn up with the polling card that everyone receives. Personally, I don't think even that is necessary, but at least everyone would be treated equally and the cost would be nil.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 09:50 AM

Let's try to get this right. The current "Liberal Party" was founded in 1989 and is not the original Liberal Party. The original Liberal Party joined ranks with the Social Democrats to form the LibDems. The 1989 Liberal Party is a relatively recent breakaway group, which has never had any clout. I wish I could say the same about the opportunist LibDems.

Shenanigans over names and name-changes matter not a jot in all this. Leopards can change their spots only by wearing a differently-spotted overcoat, but it's the same old leopard underneath (less kindly, you can put lipstick on Boris Johnson, but he's still a pig). Labour added "New" to its name in the 1990s not because it was a new party but because it wanted to sound thrusting and modern. It worked, for a while at least. But it don't work no more...

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: DMcG
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 10:09 AM

"Sterling leaped 0.7% higher to 1.20 US dollars and was 0.3% up at 1.14 euros after a government source said prime minister Rishi Sunak and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen had signed a breakthrough deal at a meeting in Windsor, Berkshire."

Well, that serves me right for ordering some Euros at the weekend for a trip to Munich next week!

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 10:20 AM

I'm sitting on a stash of euros (nearly two grands'-worth!) that I bought before the pandemic and brexit shenanigans. I'm hoping to use some on a trip to Sicily this summer. They're on my Caxton prepaid card and, whilst I know they're getting me no interest there (for most of the intervening time interest rates have been rock-bottom anyway), I comfort meself that I bought most of them when I could get €1.25 or €1.30 to the pound!

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 10:24 AM

The low take up of voter ID registration - a step closer to a being a state where having and showing on demand 'your papers' to the police while going about daily business - is a concern which can only be addressed if local electoral officers employ a team to go door to door with their laptops and ensure/assist every householder to secure ID. Then councils will need to decide which vulnerable adults will lose their care packages, which libraries/other amenities would have to be closed, etc to pay for this - a democratic RIGHT to vote must always come before a social need for services.

If the government were really interested in reducing voter fraud then why are there not measure to ensure that postal voters (which tend to have a greater take up from tory voters) have to show their ID before putting their crosses on the form, putting the form in the envelope and putting the envelope in the post box. There are so many more opportunities for voter fraud: coercion by a householder, wilful; destruction of a voter form by another person, theft of postal ballots by postal workers, etc. All of which cannot happen in a polling station.

There are other issues, of course. How much someone's appearance has changed since a photo was taken, forged ID documents, will people who turn 18 on or near polling day be able to get their proof of ID in time, backlogs in processing (if passport applications are anything to go by), loss/theft of an ID document close to polling day. Polling officers not giving voters the benefit of the doubt if they do not look enough like their photograph.

Another issue is how do voters prove the identity when they ask for proof of identity? If no proof is required, how would that prevent voter fraud?

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: The Sandman
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 11:10 AM

Steve Shaw, my point was that The Guardian is a supporter of the lib dems., whose policies are much the same as the other liberal party
I agree that it is sad that the labour party have not had a newspaper since the daily herald that supports them, but that is an inditement of uk democracy, as was the uneven funding of the brexit campaign.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 11:20 AM

Steve and Dave don't impress me as the sharpest knife in the drawer

Which one of us? Or is it both? We need to know who is being insulted so we can take offence accordingly!

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Raggytash
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 11:21 AM

:-)

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 11:56 AM

And which Steve?

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 12:01 PM

Backwoodsman, you have caught me out for not keeping up with current affairs - maybe I should buy the 'Eye' from time to time to know whose who. The first is obvious, though. Is the second who I refer to as coffee-dregs, no idea who the third is and why.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 01:00 PM

SPB - all named in Steve’s post of 08:02 AM today - Rees-Mogg, Farage, and Arlene Foster. Three perfect examples of much of what is wrong with our politics today, IMHO.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 04:29 PM

Faridge is, politicly, a nobody who has been confined to the depths of nobodiness, but unfortunately has this habit of suffusing tv and radio interviews and panels like vomit does to fresh air.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Feb 23 - 04:57 PM

So Fishy Sunak looks like getting his deal through, and Labour will back it. His next step is to get enough support from erstwhile Tory rebels to be able to get it done without Labour's help. That would be a major coup. Both his rebels and the antediluvian DUP know that to not let this pass would be electoral suicide. I think Labour are going to need more than "missions."

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: DMcG
Date: 28 Feb 23 - 03:40 AM

What do people make of this line that less than 3% of EU laws will apply in NI? Laws don't add up numerically like that: a single law might have a massive impact where even combining hundreds together might be negligible for NI of they are on citrus fruit and olive oil production. Aslo, are we talking about those laws where the EU has a rule that has not been incorporated into UK law? For example, the UK rights on maternity leave are (currently!) more generous than the EU minimum. NI follows the UK law, I believe. Does this mean the EU law is 'not being followed'. Even though, since the EU rule says it must be at or above a given standard, so it is?

And is there legal dodging going on distinguishing laws, rules and directives?

In short, what does 'only 3%' mean?

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: peteglasgow
Date: 28 Feb 23 - 06:29 AM

get o LBC now, listen to James o'Brien positively gleeful at the govt suggestion that NI now has the best trade deal in the world. right. so can't england have it? and of course -scotland? could be a very significant boast, rishi? is he 'high on his own supply' (J O'B)

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: peteglasgow
Date: 28 Feb 23 - 07:25 AM

by the way, is there a record of how many days mophead has spent working for his constituents in uxbridge in the last year? or how many days he has worked for himself in/for ukraine?

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: DMcG
Date: 28 Feb 23 - 09:10 AM

I would not normally recommend an excursion to the GBNews web site, but it is very amusing that they seem to have no article at all about the Windsor deal.

Odd, for a news site, but there you are.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: DMcG
Date: 01 Mar 23 - 02:22 AM

In my humble opinion this is one of the best articles on Brexit I have read in years.

I have had no end of discussions where people flip back and forth between Brexit as an event in Jan 21 and an ongoing process. Where purity is more important than reality.

The only thing I disagree with is a bit tongue in cheek. When he says "It is impossible to sit in the Treasury without coming to a rational understanding that the national interest demands harmonious relations with Brussels" we can all think of a chancellor who didn't manage that.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: DMcG
Date: 03 Mar 23 - 03:18 AM

I gave up watching "Question Time" shortly after Dimbleby left, but with the Windsor Framework the obvious hot topic of the week I thought I would see what they had to say.

I am afraid it really just confirmed my prejudices. Despite the new agreement and despite Sunak's exact quotations being read to them and despite a very clear indication from the audience that they were not at all happy with how Brexit has been implemented, the panellists simply refused to engage with the question or the agreement, just parroting what they have been saying since 2016. The chair did challenge them a bit - more than I expected, to be honest - but once they declined to respond to her point, she just let them carry on.

I am afraid it is back in the 'pointless' box for a few more years.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 03 Mar 23 - 04:02 AM

I gave up on question time when people like Farage were allowed to use it to spread their venom. I cannot afford to keep replacing TVs that have had bricks thrown through the screen

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 03 Mar 23 - 06:56 AM

”I gave up on question time when people like Farage were allowed to use it to spread their venom.”

Me too, Dave. Since 2015 or so I seldom waste time watching it - bad for my blood-pressure!

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Mar 23 - 11:03 AM

65% of Uk citizens want a Brexit referendum do over. It's a Regretzit.
Your economy has sunk below Russia. Brexit came about through an ordinary vilification of people who had the feeling they had no authority, they had no voice When they were given a binary choice they saw a button that said fuck off the establishment and many people pressed it. Because of the fact that the government doesn't ultimately act in accordance with its ordinary citizens in much the same way as it does in America the protest vote was a fool's errand. People are disillusioned and dissatisfied. Britain wasn't great before during or after Brexit. I can understand why people are disillusioned by centralized bureaucracy. The ongoing condemnation of ordinary people is not helpful. Banks, Big Pharma and the industrial corporate military complex is the system we have and sustains itself to our sacrifice. Sure one party may be slightly better than the other one but they both feed the same systematic bullshit.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Mar 23 - 11:41 AM

Hmm. Maybe you have to live here.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Mar 23 - 05:11 PM

Everyplace has its bubbles

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Stanron
Date: 04 Mar 23 - 06:09 PM

How deprived we must seem to Donuel here in the UK without spray on cheese, ridiculous gun laws and State condoned murder. Now, with the price of US visas, I guess I'll just have to stay here.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Mar 23 - 06:29 PM

Stanron, in another age you could be my hero. :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 05 Mar 23 - 05:28 AM

Seen on the ‘Sheffield for Europe’ FB Page today…

”Seven years ago, I kicked a massive hole in my fence to make myself feel better about the integrity of my garden. My plants died. My neighbours called me stupid, so I stopped talking to them.

Today, I fixed part of the fence. Not all, just part.

I’m now describing this as a triumph.”

Really puts the supreme idiocy of Johnson’s ‘Oven-ready Brexit’ into full focus.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 05 Mar 23 - 05:30 AM

Should have been, ‘Really puts the supreme idiocy of Johnson’s ‘Oven-ready Brexit’, and the arrogance and dishonesty of the current government, into full focus’.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Mar 23 - 05:31 PM

Aargh! Can't access that "Football - not the US kind" thread, so this one will have to do:


Ahem:


Liverpool 7 Manchester United 0


And I will neither duck nor get me coat!

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Mar 23 - 08:16 PM

You're very quiet, Raggytash...

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Senoufou
Date: 06 Mar 23 - 02:21 AM

Oh Steve, husband came flying through from his study with a face of doom, to tell me this result. He's been an ardent fan of ManU for decades (even when he lived in Africa). My first gift to him all those years ago was a ManU shirt and sports bag when we met up in Accra. He also supports Norwich City FC, and at least they beat Millwall 3-2.
However, being a real football tart, he's just taken delivery of a Chelsea tracksuit merely because 'he likes the colour'!

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 06 Mar 23 - 03:27 AM

I’m quoting from a friend’s FB feed here, I’m not naming the source because I don’t have permission, but it’s absolutely right on the button…

The whole Sue Gray thing…

In business, people go from one company to a competitor all the time. It is perfectly possible to switch roles, allegiances, etc in the professional context without it being any indicator of dodgy integrity! It’s called work. You know, that thing the majority of us do for most of our life to earn an honest day’s pay? (Because, Boris, normal people don’t have wealthy backers who can lend us £800k every so often.)

It’s about seeking interesting roles and intellectual challenge rather than sacrificing personal integrity in a pointless attempt to protect yours, Boris. You were singing her praises last year and now you’re trying to smear her! Just be quiet!

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 06 Mar 23 - 04:18 AM

Steve,
This thread is supposed to be about politics, not religion!

DC

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 06 Mar 23 - 06:04 AM

Doug, do we really want to go into a long debate about the separation (or lack of) between church and state - though this probably would be more relevant to US politics than UK politics.

In terms of football results, a would suggest this has less to do with religious cultism and more to do with tribalism - and that could have relevance to the state we find the country in today.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 06 Mar 23 - 09:09 AM

Okay, if the round ball game has to be mentioned:

Here's to Wrexham who (partly thanks to McElhenney & Reynolds) are currently in a good lead in the national league.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Mar 23 - 09:41 AM

The Wrexham miracle belongs to the players and fans. Not the owners.
Almost similar to the States you have one party that is an outrageous bald-faced liar and another party that leaves out key essential truths.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Mar 23 - 09:42 AM

John, stop going off-topic by trying to stay on-topic!

I think we're waiting for Sue Gray all over again...

Anyway, Boris want to make his dad Stanley a knight. That would be the Stanley who smacked Caroline Nokes firmly on the bottom at the Tory conference 20 years ago. There's even talk of Carrie getting some sort of gong. God, what fun!

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: DMcG
Date: 06 Mar 23 - 11:28 AM

I am not sure "waiting for Sue Gray" adequately describes the going-on in the House of Commons at this very moment. From the fury, some of the Conservatives might not make it out of the chamber without having a heart attack.

Which of them was it who said "calm down, dear" (quoting tha advertisement)?

It would be good advice to follow themselves.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 06 Mar 23 - 12:57 PM

”From the fury, some of the Conservatives might not make it out of the chamber without having a heart attack”

You’re making a very rash assumption there, that some of them have hearts, DMcG. Not, by any stretch of the imagination, a certainty!

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 07 Mar 23 - 03:22 AM

So the government are now redefining illegal. people of Britain take heart if you are every up before a judge; all you have to say in your defence is that you haven't actually broken any laws but just pushed the boundaries. If it is good enough for the government, it is good enough for the entire population.

I am also concerned about the narrative that requiring agencies to go against international human rights law will be taking us a step closer to fascism and any individual who obeys the government's orders in the line of their work will face a long prison term. Obeying order that violate international law must not be allowed as a defence.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Rain Dog
Date: 07 Mar 23 - 09:27 AM

There is no easy way of dealing with it. I certainly don't know how it can be done. I have said before that I don't think I could do the job of an immigration officer, deciding who can and who cannot stay in the UK. I also do not think we can have unlimited immigration either. So how do we proceed?

It is not just the UK who are trying to work out what can be done. The EU is also trying to find a better way of dealing with it. Their ideas do not include letting more people in.

Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics - 2
From: Rain Dog
Date: 07 Mar 23 - 09:37 AM

The first part of my previous post was lost.

Yet again we have more talk from ministers playing to the gallery. They have been doing so for the last 13 years. Before that we had Labour trying to deal with it.The numbers keep increasing despite their talk.

Far easier to spout shite to the press rather than find a way to actually deal with and ease the problem.

There are no easy solutions.

I certainly don't have one.