Hereβs an irony. Mrs May says defending the Union of the UK is one of her fundamental principles. Yet in three of herΒ misjudgements over Brexit she puts its future more at risk.
In Northern Ireland the upholders of the Union are the majority community who vote DUP and similar Β parties. Mrs May instead accepts the analysis of Sinn Fein and the Republic of Ireland, used by the EU to damage Brexit. AllΒ ofΒ this groupΒ wish to end the union of the UK and Β create an island of IrelandΒ economic area, as a stepping stone to an island of Ireland country. This is proving damaging to Brexit, threatens the end of Mrs Mayβs coalition Β and is incomprehensible to Unionists in Northern Ireland. Mrs May needs to be on the side of the Unionists who want to support her.
Most of the people of the Union live in England. Mrs May ignores us. The word England rarely crosses her lips. No one speaks for England in the endless devolution/Brexit talks. The strong pro Brexit vote in England is never mentioned.It is as if Mrs May is forgetful Β of the voting base that gave her the largest Conservative vote since Margaret Thatcher. It is high time she balanced her view of the Union with recognition of Englandβs needs, to create a more realistic and even union.
The third mistake is in her handling of Scotland. If you want to keep the union together you cannot keep giving concessions to an Independence party called the SNP who do not speak for the majority in Scotland upon the only issue that matters to them. Their understandable habit of turning every issue into one about independence wears thin after they lost a referendum on this very question. The PM has to appeal over the heads of the SNP to the pro Union majority in Scotland, Labour, Conservative and others. SheΒ has Β to say No to anti Union demands by the SNP where these are against the spirit of Β Brexit. Fortunately the SNP lost two referendums in the right order. They first lost the Scottish independence referendum, so they then had to accept the validity of theΒ UK wide EU referendum. It’s no good them saying Scotland voted Remain, as the electorate was the whole UK. Their refusal to accept the UK wide result shows how anti democratic they are. They have become the neverendum party wanting to have more referendums on the same topics until they get a result they like.
Mrs May should try disagreeing with the enemies of our Union more, whilstΒ being more in harmony with its defenders. The defenders of the Union accept Brexit, as that is the will of the majority in the Union referendum. It is central to the future of the Union that Brexit is delivered properly and promptly. England expects. Wales expects. All those Leave voters in Northern Ireland and Scotland expect. We only keep our Union if Union decisions matter and are implementedΒ by the politicians.
October 14, 2018
Reading the DT this morning matters seem to be coming to a head with everything untavelling. She through Ollie Robbins aided by a supine cabinet, indeed they have a lot to answer for, crumbled to EU demands whilst dissembling to the public with utterances that are contrary to the reality of what is happening.
Is there no one in No 10 with the balls to tell her how risible much of what she says comes over. We have to be close to the end game in more ways than one. Time for a stalking horse.
October 14, 2018
Trapped in the Customs Union will mean that we can never leave.
Trapped in the Customs Union will mean we could not even rejoin as a voting member. They would have us exactly where they want us, free to bring every possible regulation that would disadvantage Britain, while still taking our money.
The moment Theresa May described her own party as the Nasty Party should have immediately disqualified her from any front bench post, let alone leader and Prime Minister.
How many votes and seat did her Nasty Party comment cost?
October 15, 2018
Stephen Priest
” They would have us exactly where they want us, free to bring every possible regulation that would disadvantage Britain”
==
Don’t these regulations apply to ALL EU members?
So how can that disadvantage us?
It is these regulations that have given the EU a reputation for quality so that unlike the ‘Buy Chinese, buy twice’ saying, customers can rely on getting the quality they deserve.
That’s what has made the EU the wealthiest, most popular trading bloc in the world.
It is our past reputation for wanting constant opt outs that have annoyed so many other EU members and they have little sympathy for more of the same with Brexit.
October 16, 2018
margaret howard
“Donβt these regulations apply to ALL EU members?
So how can that disadvantage us?”
Well because the regulations are adopted most often based on lobbying by groups/businesses that will benefit
Hence the German car industry lobbying for diesel when its bad for the environment
French Farmers lobbying for their produce
European white goods manufacturers ( vacuum cleaners)
Italian tomato growers etc etc etc
Oh so we can’t have opt outs or change any rules or regulations… but hold on a moment the Remain camp keep telling us to stay in the EU and change it from within. Make your mind up, which is it?
Here have a read, educate yourself
https://corporateeurope.org/power-lobbies/2017/12/corporate-lobbying-influence-over-council-eu
October 15, 2018
Not as many as her vote for me and I will kick Tory supporters in the teeth Manifesto did. Nor as many as having a tax to death grim reaper chancellor with the highest taxation for nearly 50 years at No. 11.
October 14, 2018
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2018/10/14/leaked-eu-memo-claims-theresa-may-set-strike-secret-brexit-deal/
“Leaked EU memo claims Theresa May to strike ‘secret’ Brexit deal”
I suspect she’s long ago struck a secret deal with her EU friends, just as on previous occasions it’s now mostly play-acting to pull the wool over the eyes of the plebs.
October 14, 2018
Exactly. Surely May must now be pushed out. She has proved to be wrong headed (as you detail above) on nearly every single thing on the Brexit strategy. She is also profoundly wrong on economic policy, the size of the state, her endless interventionism, on HS2, Hinkley C, building on worker “rights”, on rental property, on OTT bank regulation, on the tax levels, the gig economy, the subsidies for daft green crap, the second rate state monopoly NHS, the endless waste, on her choice of chancellor, on Carney, on prices and wage controls, the sugar tax, on the NHS, on education, on the gig economy, …. indeed on almost everything she ever touches.
Why do the Tories endlessly elect such misguided and disingenuous left wing PMs who pretend to be Conservative then do the compete opposite of what is needed? Heath, Major, Cameron and now Appeaser May. Even Thatcher killed many good grammar schools and rather failed to cut the state down to a sensible size and she signed very damaging EU treaties. Plus she selected the economic illiterate dope Major as Chancellor and even let him join the ERM disaster and then to replace her.
October 14, 2018
I detect that our host is finally accepting what we have been pointing out for the last two years. Mrs May is a plant, she works for Brussels. The evidence is clear.
π»ππππ ππ π πππ π ππ πππ πππππππ ππ πππ, πΎππππ πππππ ππ πππ πππππ , ππππ π ππ ππ πππππππ. πΆππππππ , πππ πππ ππππππ ππ πππππ ππππ ππ πππππ ππ ππππππππ πππ ππ ππππππππ. πΆπ ππππ π ππππ πππ πππ ππ πππ ππππππ. π¨ππ ππ ππππ ππππ πππ πππππππ ππππ ππ ππππππ, ππ ππππ πππ ππππππππ.
October 14, 2018
The Conservative stalking horse should be bolting out before the EU slides our Β£39bn wedge under their exit door.
We should stabilise ourselves as a free nation, not remain bolted inside the EU saddled with a bunch of nags.
October 14, 2018
You omitted to mention the Foreign Development Aid scam. Otherwise, well done!
October 14, 2018
Or her gender and racial pay gap agenda, calorie counts in restaurants, killing the gig economy, minister for suicides ….. there is no end to her pathetic, misguided, interventionist lunacy.
October 14, 2018
Northern Ireland voted Remain. The DUP are an extremist minority party. Your habit of thinking you know better than the people who actually live and work in Northern Ireland is sickening but, as we have known from English Conservatives treatment of Ireland over the centuries, typical
Reply The pro Union voters are clearly in the majority which is why NI is part of the UK. We only have volunteers in our union which rests on majority consent
October 14, 2018
Extremist? When the argument is lost invoke Godwin’s Law. Mendacious, infantile and intellectually bankrupt.
October 14, 2018
Duncan, As a party opposed to the Good Friday Agreement, an agreement supported at the time by most other parties in NI and Conservative and Labour parties in Great Britain, how would you call the DUP?
October 15, 2018
hefner
Oh oh oh I know the answer to this one heffie , The DUP are democratically elected members of a political party that you dont agree with , bit like the Labour Party, or UKIP , or indeed any party you dont agree with
October 15, 2018
Thank you but oh oh oh I have another one for you: why does the UK government have to listen to the DUP when the same DUP has been unable for months to agree to form a government in Northern Ireland? Isn’t it giving a bit too much of importance to a party that after all was not representing the majority thinking of NI people in June 2016?
October 16, 2018
hefner
By all means ask a totally unrelated and different question.
The answer is of course that they dont HAVE to, they need to in order to get their commons majority .
You could also ask why did the government ask the Scots about independence but not the English
You might ask why Norway voted TWICE to not be in the EU but their politicians still tied them in .
You might ask why France voted NON to ratifying the EU constitution but were made to vote again
See also Holland and Ireland
The answer to all these questions is because we dont live in a functioning democracy. Since the advent of the EU our politicians have dispensed with listening to the majority of the people
October 17, 2018
Funnily I agree with your comments. My point was mainly to ridicule Lifelogic who keeps harping on the SNP tail wagging the Labour dog, and being unable to see the same happening with the DUP wagging the CUP.
But that’s the beauty of having LL here; before starting to read any of his contributions, one already knows what the most part of it will be.
October 15, 2018
Can’t remember the English having a vote on the GFA.
Why do the English have no representation on the British Irish Council ( part of strand 3 GFA) or were we supposed to be broken into nine EUSSR regions without a vote.
Takes it all back to the two Welshman Heseltine and Howe who stitched Margeret Thatcher up leaving Major to sign Masstrict that brought in the Regions and therefor breaking England up without any kind of vote.
October 14, 2018
“We only have volunteers in our union which rests on majority consent” – indeed people will stay only if it is worth staying (it is) and they know they could leave at any point should they wish to.
Rather unlike the EU’s agenda.
October 14, 2018
reply to reply..Not so..the reason NI is still part of the UK is because in 1918 the General Election result for Ireland threw up a 70 per cent vote for Sinn Fein against 20 per cent for the Unionists which the British government at the time didn’t like so after years of war forced on us they drew the border..against the wishes of the vast numbers of Irish people. On top of that the UK government then turned a blind eye to the great injustices heaped onto the NI nationalist people for the next fifty years until we all know what happened. We have now reached the stage where demographics are taking over and soon again the Unionists will be overtaken by the nationalists..it’s only a matter of a very short time..might even be in the next GE. The making of the UK was never anything about consent not for Scotland and not for Ireland
October 14, 2018
Michael O’Sullivan,
For those of us who are not experts, could you clarify when an independent island of Ireland has been united?
Thanks.
October 15, 2018
What about this? Henry VIII and his daughter Elizabeth I saw Ireland as a country to be subdued because they in their wisdom deemed it to be the back door by which Spain might invade England. The plantation of Ulster was a device to throw the Irish off their land and supplant them with English and Scots.
Caterpillar, Is this going back enough for you?
October 14, 2018
For crying out loud, it’s now coming up to 28 years since the UK government declared that it had no “selfish strategic or economic interest” in Northern Ireland and would accept unification with the Republic if that was what the population wanted, so why are you going back to 1918 to try to contradict our host? Are you sure you don’t want to drag up Oliver Cromwell? As for Scotland, you obviously have even less idea what you are talking about.
October 14, 2018
Well if and when a majority in Ulster want a union with the Republic of Ireland, then – assuming the Republic are open to it (I think there will a debate there as to whether itβs really desirable) – that is what should happen, following a free and fair referendum. No one who professes a belief in democracy and self-determination should however call for a united Ireland against the wishes of the majority of the people of Ulster.
October 15, 2018
The inconvenient truth for Varadkar is that Eire can’t afford a United Ireland. They don’t have a spare Β£10bn to subsidise the province as we do. It would treble their deficit to almost 10% of GDP, by coincidence roughly the same figure as an independent Scotland would suffer.
The EU requires deficits to be no more than 3% of GDP, unless you’re France, of course.
October 15, 2018
true and the reason the GFA provides for NI to be absorbed into Ireland in the long term. it requires the consent of both NI and Ireland in separate referenda. Until then the GFA requires the signatories to resect the constitutional and territorial integrity of each other’s countries_ UK and Ireland. This is why Mrs May should tell the EU and Ireland to stop making waves over Brexit and if there is the slightest hint of insurgency or terrorism post Brexit UK will demand they take action to suppress it or face the consequences. And BTW the GFA says noting about the border apart from removing the security apparatus. The existing tax, VAT etc border is wholly compatible with the GFA as would be the ERG’s and IEA’s Plan A+ proposals.
October 15, 2018
We will see if the numbers mean that the Catholics take over NI, many might have expected it way before now.The IRA might have alienated less people and made more progress by making love, and thus voters, rather than terrorism and by killing people. But many voted with their feet in deserting Ireland since 1918; and it was then not one nation but two, in that year, just as the sister island has three nations. Bombs never took Ulster and an Ulster that does not agree will not be easy for Dublin to ever hold onto.
Note that one big factor in the Remain vote in NI was all the polls showing a total UK Remain vote before the actual result.
October 14, 2018
No, the DUP are an extremist party in your opinion.
In my opinion, they aren’t.
October 14, 2018
Go to WTO and let the Irish stew overnight. Zero tariff will be ready by lunchtime.
October 14, 2018
HOw do you know this will be the case?
October 14, 2018
And how do YOU know it will not?
October 15, 2018
Because Irish cheddarand Dutch Gouda will be too expensive, as will Irish beef and Danish bacon and tinned ham. We don’t need your food and you don’t import much of ours. Hopefully, this will help. Common sense really, but unfortunately missing in the civil service and Commission.
October 14, 2018
Ireland is our friend and ally. We should not want them to stew. But they are being used by the EU in a way which will take a certain amount of patching up in relations post Brexit.
October 15, 2018
Ally possibly, friend no. Likewise the EU whose Brexit strategy is actually predicated upon UK being an existential threat to it.
BTW I was brought up in Co Kildare, Ireland and married an Irish woman.
October 14, 2018
Reply to reply
So when will the English be asked to give their consent to remain in such a union ? After all, everyone else has had a few goes !
October 14, 2018
The English have their say as part of the UK. We are in a political union.
October 15, 2018
As did the Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish. Why not England? It seems the English are the only nation to whom the right of self-determination does not apply.
October 14, 2018
Northern Ireland voted Remain
Irrelevant. The UK voted to Leave. NI is part of the UK. The Good Friday Agreement provides the option for NI to hold a referendum on continued “membership” of the UK (an option not available to English voters). That option is always there and can be used anytime – following any controversial decision.
The rest of us can’t keep having a gun held to our heads every time key decisions are made which may impact different regions of the country. The UK should leave the EU and make every effort to ensure the border between NI and Ireland is as friction-free as possible . If the EU want something different that will be up to them.
October 14, 2018
I believe that the referendum was for the UK as a whole and not for Northern Ireland, Wales, Scotland or England as individual nations.
October 14, 2018
At 28% the DUP have the greatest electoral support of any party in Northern Ireland. (At the last election in the Irish Republic, Fine Gael got less support than that – 25.5% of the popular vote. And Sinn Fein got 9.9%.)
As for ‘extremists’ – polarised, extreme opinions are endemic to the political climate of Northern Ireland, and indeed Ireland in general. But since Gladstone’s First Home Rule Bill, Ulster has voted to remain part of the United Kingdom, and until they vote otherwise, they are.
October 14, 2018
What a mysterious post. Mrs May has made no concessions to the SNP. Why would she? Are you losing your grip on reality, Mr Redwood?
Reply Yes she has made concessions to all these anti Union forces.
October 14, 2018
Well, what are the concessions? I have seen none at all.
Reply Allowing the Scottish government various roles and say in Brexit matters and over the future relationship which are clearly Union matters, not devolved matters. The Customs Union discussion reflect Scottish as well as Irish concerns.
October 14, 2018
Reply to reply – May has said she wants the interests of the devolved nations to be taken into account regarding Brexit and has had various meetings with the First Ministers at no. 10. Of course she has had no such meetings with the First Minister of predominately Brexit voting England because England has no First Minister so obviously the interests of England regarding Brexit are of no concern to May whatsoever. That could explain why she is happy to betray the 17.4 million mainly English people who voted Brexit.
October 14, 2018
Yep ! That’s how I see it too.
October 14, 2018
Absolutely right.
October 14, 2018
The post is absolutely correct. She clearly “caters” “bends over”, however you like to put it for a long list of people who have nothing to do with her constituency:
Sinn Fein
Irish Republic
Greens
SNP
Labour
Merkel
Juncker
Classically, now we’re prosecuting English folk who might make a mistake with their prescription charges while Scots get theirs free anyway! Imagine if this was the other way round! May would be calling immediately for abolition of prescription charges for the Scots!
Totally misguided – it’s difficult to believe that the people of Maidenhead aren’t noticing something’s adrift here!
October 14, 2018
May and the Tories have proved they don’t give a stuff about England. Otherwise they would be calling for an end to not only prescription charges, FREE in the rest of the dis-UK, exorbitant hospital parking charges, FREE in the rest of the dis-UK and tuition fees, free or heavily subsidised in the rest of the dis-UK. Scotland also enjoys free eye tests, free dental checks and free personal care for the elderly whilst England, the only net contributor to the UK coffers, is denied ALL the above on ‘grounds of cost’ yet their taxes are expected to provide them for everywhere else in the dis-UK, just not England.
Why the English are putting up with this blatant discrimination against our young, our sick and our elderly is the biggest mystery. UK Governments, this Tory one included, are taking us for mugs.
October 15, 2018
The only reason Scotland has all these freebies is because Westminster is prepared to give Sturgeon Β£10bn of English taxpayer’s money every year to keep her province afloat.
If Westminster was not so afraid of the Nationalists it would demand that Scottish spending be reduced and the deficit be brought in line with that of England.
October 15, 2018
Chris
“Westminster is prepared to give Sturgeon Β£10bn of English taxpayerβs money every year to keep her province afloat”
==
A snip of what it gets from Scottish oil and whisky tax. Why else the desperation to keep Scotland on board?
October 16, 2018
margaret howard
I’m afraid that once again you are entirely wrong .
Scotland gets far more money than it generates in taxes and duties including oil and gas and this has been the case for the last 18 years
Full Fact
https://fullfact.org/economy/tax-and-spending-scotland/
October 14, 2018
Well one of this here parish has. Just need to convince some 26,500 to do what a good number of so called Tory MP’s won’t π
October 14, 2018
Sir Jose,
Is your imagination taking a bit over here? She cannot stand Juncker or the SNP?
October 14, 2018
But I doubt that Maidonians – for so we are known – will have the opportunity to express their displeasure with Theresa May at another election.
October 14, 2018
Tory Western. The SNP have clearly had concessions. What about the Β£40m VAT bill for the police and fire service that the SNP knew they would have to pay but moaned so much about it that Westminster let them off. What about the tax returns on oil fields that Scotland now receives? What about the Β£3.3m tax freeze on whisky sales? Perhaps the biggest of all, the fact that Scotland gets a say in things pertaining to England and votes in parliament but England can’t vote against anything devolved to Scotland. Scotland gets Β£1470 per head more to spend on public services but still managed to run up a dirty great bill this year. Still, never mind, England will bail them out. England is just a cash cow. John, you are so right. Who is speaking for the majority who live in Scotland and want to be in the UK? Those of us who want to remain in the UK are sick to death of the constant independence issue. We had the vote so now just get on with running the country and stop making waves for the rest of the UK.
October 14, 2018
Yes should be ‘No’in reply JR.
October 14, 2018
Theresa May has followed in the footsteps of Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and David Cameron in allowing the Scottish government to act beyond its devolved powers as defined in the UK legislation which created it.
Just to be clear, it is not down to Nicola Sturgeon or any other Scottish First Minister to decide that shall be another independence referendum. The fact that the media are allowed to report events as though that is a devolved power, without any contradiction from the UK government, reflects the latter’s weakness.
Personally I would not be dead set against the UK government granting voters in Scotland a repeat vote on independence if they really wanted it, but only when the impact of Brexit on Scotland was a matter more of fact than speculation.
We all leave together, the dire predictions of economic and other disasters turn out to be completely overblown, fabricated, and then after say a decade the Scots could be asked whether they were content to continue as a part of an independent UK or they would prefer to be dragged back into EU subjugation by the SNP.
October 14, 2018
The SNP has demanded that any powers that are returned from Brussels are given to them. Even if these powers are UK powers and not devolved powers. This is the price that the SNP and others have demanded of the PM in order to get their support for Chequers and her sellout of the UK. England does not have anyone with similar leverage speaking for us.
Simple.
October 14, 2018
Even Dan Hannan who initially supported Chequers thinks it is now is a step too far.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2018/10/14/brexit-theresa-mays-terms-would-worst-worlds/
Also Boris today in the Sunday Telegraph:-
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/10/13/backing-telegraphs-campaign-capitalism/
Indeed the lack of understanding (particularly by younger people) plus a few brainless oldies (like Corbyn, Mc Donnall, May and Hammond) that capitalism works and it is the goose that lays the golden eggs is breathtaking. Schools, universities, the BBC and government propaganda is filling our children’s minds with endless misguided, big government, high tax, green crap, NHS *the envy of the World) drivel.
A good podcast interview by James Delingpole of Yaron Brook (of the Ayn Rand Institute) on this topic this week.
October 14, 2018
Not sure where Hannan’s brain went initially with that support- her Chequers deal was always nuts, looked at practically or academically.
October 14, 2018
I agree. Almost everything that May and Hammond come up with (on any issue) is!
October 14, 2018
LL. Hannan, like so many others in the Conservative party now are just looking out for their own backsides. This is the problem. There is no true loyalty to democracy or what their party really stands for. Sickening.
October 14, 2018
I used to follow Daniel Hannan’s Telegraph blog at a time when he favoured leaving the EU and moving to a position similar to Norway.
Eventually he admitted that he was not overly concerned about the mass immigration which followed from the fourth of the EU’s “four freedoms” and which would inevitably continue if we did as he suggested.
There are now those who argue for “Norway then Canada”, ignoring the fact that neither Norway nor Canada are in any kind of customs union with the EU and so the largely fabricated problem of the Irish border would still be there, and would still appear to be insoluble, at both stages.
Interestingly the previous UK ambassador to the EU, Sir Ivan Rogers, has recently given a speech in the course of which he dismissed any notion of joining EFTA and staying in the EEA as an intermediate stage:
https://share.trin.cam.ac.uk/sites/public/Comms/Rogers_brexit_as_revolution.pdf
“… even leaving aside the legal objections … there is now no earthly reason for either the EU27 or the EEA to agree such a deal.
The ancien regime, after all, has no good reason to provide the finest transitional feather bed for the revolutionaries who want to leave it.”
“Nor does the EEA, which functions essentially fine as a permanent home for its members … want or need the arrival of a massive transiting cuckoo in the nest, which only wants in, in order to have a nice perch before it is ready to fly off out to something it thinks better.”
But I doubt this has impinged on the consciousness of Mike Stallard …
October 14, 2018
Whoah! Finally a spark of lucidity. Progress.
October 14, 2018
Meanwhile Esther McVey warns that the final bill for the high speed rail line could exceed Β£100 billion. Did anyone sensible really expect it to be less than this?
Surely it is not too late for government to cancel this massive and very damaging waste of tax payers’ money?
October 14, 2018
Lifelogic
Only Β£100 Billion ?
Think I can guarantee it will be much more than that.
October 14, 2018
No change No Chance, as someone once said.
Saving Β£100bn on HS2 for lternative use over the next 10 years or so would be one of the most immediate boosts from a Change.
October 14, 2018
May I remind everybody of UKIP’s policies, increase personal tax allowance to Β£13k and abolish the following:
β’ Inheritance Tax
β’ HS2
β’ Stamp Duty
β’ Foreign Aid
β’ TV Licence
β’ EU membership
β’ Tuition Fees for STEM subjects
October 14, 2018
Yes fine, but UKIP will never get in with first past the post voting or even without it. The Tory party must be taken over again by the sensible wing.
October 14, 2018
That’s what we’ve been conditioned to believe by the Establishment, so it becomes self fulfilling but electoral upsets do happen.
How much did you win on Mr Trump’s victory or the EU referendum?
October 14, 2018
All of which I seem to agree with. Hmmm.
October 14, 2018
How can giving one group of English STEM students free tuition be fair either to those studying other subjects and indeed those STEM graduates going before them that are now paying an effective 9% graduation tax over Β£17,000pa, so tonnes of graduates coming up behind them can depress wages because theyβll be 9% cheaper to hire, this is as stupid as Labours free for all. STEM students are amongst the most highly sought, highly rewarded grads and I say this as a STEM Masters gradβs mother.
Scotland, Wales, Ireland shouldnβt be free if we have a graduate contribution in the union for further education it should be all or cancel all including those going before or get lost Bob and UKIP.
October 14, 2018
@a-tracy
So if the Chancellor wanted to reduce say stamp duty or income tax, or VAT it would be unfair to everyone that paid the previously higher rate? is that your contention?
Good luck with that logic.
October 15, 2018
You don’t pay stamp duty for 30 years Bob at 9% of your income over the lel. It is a one off payment not a lifelong tax.
I believe we’d see long term the effect of that cancelled charge on the people paying this 9% tax for the past ten years and those still paying another 30 years, especially if students coming up behind them are cheaper to recruit pushing down graduate wages or wealthier by 9% because they are no longer paying for their tuition, there is already resentment in the Union but you believe your comparison if you choose.
October 15, 2018
@a-tracy
No, but on a London home the stamp duty on a purchase could be Β£50k,each time you move house.
But why are you comparing Stamp Duty to Tuition fees?
UKIP want them both scrapped, in addition to IHT and TV Licences.
October 14, 2018
There is no chance of our current Parliament cancelling HS2.
It is an EU project designed to use UK taxpayers money to provide employment and profits for other EU countries.
Why is the government pursuing Hinkley C ?
A project being built by a French company to a design which they cannot yet get right and funded by the Chinese.
October 14, 2018
Indeed and look at what a mess they are making of the new French one. hugely delays and over budget.
October 15, 2018
EDF would probably be relieved if the government said that they could build a Westinghouse, Korean, Chinese, or Russian design that worked, cost less and takes 7 years to finish. The Finns are doing this after their Hinkley delays and cost increase.Toshiba’s is in financial difficultly because of cock up in the US and the UK and France could buy it, already approved an set to go. We need 10 nukes to power transport, heating and replace existing.
October 15, 2018
France has 58 Nuclear power plants of which 34 are of one design and 20 of another.
These have all performed well and provide cheap and plentiful supplies independent of the weather.
Why we cannot build several new plants here based on one of these proven designs is a mystery. The French must have saved billions through economies of scale yes even they are building a version of the Hinkley Point design which is proving troublesome in the extreme.
We have a severe predicted shortfall in power that wind will not solve so a quick, simpler solution is badly needed. To be green it needs to be Nuclear so why Hinkley point which is surely the HS2 of the power industry ?
October 15, 2018
The older PWR designs like the French and out Sizewell don’t meet new standards. They have to withstand an airliner crashing on the reactor and other systems have to work in the event of damage. All after the World Trade Centre and Fukushima.
By the way, in Finland, Rolls Royce were brought in to improve the control system when they had trouble with their new nuke. We could insist that Chinese or Russian designs were built with Rolls controls for security and at least have some British input.
October 14, 2018
Zero compensation for people within earshot/sight of the route. Devastation of countryside. Destruction of homes at a time of housing crisis.
Madness.
October 14, 2018
Anonymous
Same deal for those having massive wind farms put up close to their properties.
October 14, 2018
As for the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, we intend to have a non-physical border.
If the Republic wishes to add physical checks on its side, that is a matter for them.
Talk of back-stops is eu/BBC talk and the government shouldnβt play this game.
We should have a plan to remove ourselves from the eu by the end of March 2019 and stick to it.
No fudge. No extension. Just leave.
October 14, 2018
Kenneth
We did have a plan to leave the EU, it was called the referendum, which meant as you say; no fudge just leave.
It was derailed by shysters within government and big business who only respect democracy when it goes in their favour.
October 14, 2018
Steve
It was derailed by shysters within government and big business who only respect democracy when it goes in their favour.
You left out the BBC who have more than enough to answer for
October 14, 2018
The idea in this technology driven day and age of having a physical border where people unpack goods to check they are as described and meet certain standards actually at a border is totally absurd. That is not how it works anywhere really you just tackle the criminal element with intelligence and sensible fines, prosecutions & such selective interventions.
October 14, 2018
On the contrary, that is how it works everywhere. Where states have different tariffs and regulations, there is ALWAYS a hard border – true across the world
October 14, 2018
The Commission plans electronic borders were published years ago, including borders with non-EU countries. Look it up. Freely available on Google.
October 14, 2018
https://ec.europa.eu/taxation_customs/general-information-customs/electronic-customs_en
October 15, 2018
Or this – http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2017/596828/IPOL_STU(2017)596828_EN.pdf
Smart Border 2
October 15, 2018
As cancelled by Vardakar when he took his new job and found an EU hand up his back….
October 14, 2018
Switzerland for example.
October 14, 2018
Indeed Ireland currently too.
October 14, 2018
Except where it is decided that the border can be left open and those differences can be accommodated by other means. For example, as the UK government is very well aware even if you are not:
https://www.ft.com/content/4e3d830a-52dc-11e8-b24e-cad6aa67e23e
“… Liechtenstein … seems an unlikely inspiration for the UK as it aims simultaneously to leave the EU customs union, maintain frictionless trade with Europe and avoid a hard border in Ireland.
But the Alpine stateβs place inside two separate regimes β the Swiss customs union and the EU-linked European Economic Area (EEA) β has made it a laboratory for Brussels-compliant, hybrid solutions to vexing trade problems.
Britain is exploring its system of βparallel marketabilityβ, a legal fix agreed by the EU in 1995 that allowed Liechtenstein to straddle two distinct economic spaces with conflicting standards on goods.
One senior Whitehall official described it as βa very interesting ideaβ, with relevance to the effort to avoid a hard Northern Ireland border. βIt is a good answer in theory,β said the official. βWe need to look at how it would work in practice.β”
So back in May according to that FT article a senior Whitehall official was aware of the concept of “parallel marketability”, and thought it was “a good answer in theory”, and it was being explored.
SO WHY HAVE WE HEARD NOTHING MORE ABOUT IT?
Not even to explain why on closer examination it turned out not to be a suitable solution to the ‘problem’ of the Irish border?
Could that conceivably be because Theresa May and her favourite euromaniac civil servant want to use this ‘problem’ as a pretext to keep us as much under the EU thumb as they can manage?
October 14, 2018
On the contrary, that is how it works everywhere. Where states have different tariffs and regulations, there is ALWAYS a hard border
Could you define !hard border” ?
Ireland and NI have different VAT rates, currencies, and excise duties – so do they have a “hard” border? How, for example, does a micro-brewery in the South ensure that appropriate excise duties are paid on any goods it exports to the North?
October 14, 2018
Do you seriously believe that all the containers that are shipped across the world are physically opened and thoroughly checked, one by one?
October 14, 2018
Some people may unthinkingly assume that is the case.
If it chose to do so the UK government could easily disabuse them of that mistaken idea, highlighting for example that only 1.3% of containers from WTO countries are inspected at UK points of entry:
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2018/10/12/my-speech-during-the-debate-on-the-agriculture-bill-10-october-2018/#comment-966135
Instead the UK government apparatus is being wrongfully employed to deliberately deceive the citizens, promoting what can be described as a false consciousness in their minds with the intention of driving them to accept whatever rubbish deal Theresa May agrees.
This level of deception might well be justifiable if we were at war with a foreign enemy, but the war here is between those whose primary loyalty is to the EU and the rest of us.
October 14, 2018
Well said. Take Switzerland for example. It has hard borders with the EU for goods – which means customs checks and paperwork. People move without hassle as Switzerland is in Schengen. Norway – Sweden is another example. Compared to what we have now it is bureaucracy central.
The Brexiteers promised to slash red tape. Actually they are simply making loads more of it. Except the tape is now red, white and blue.
October 14, 2018
Take Switzerland for example. It has hard borders with the EU for goods β which means customs checks and paperwork
At the border? You sure Andy?
October 14, 2018
Lorna
Wrong
Go away and do some research before posting
October 14, 2018
Libertarian,
When is the lecture I have been invited to at my old university?
October 15, 2018
hans
Missed it old boy, not doing another LSE lecture until next year.
Behind the curve as usual hans.
October 14, 2018
That is what the UK government should have announced in the autumn of 2017 when it had become clear that the new Irish government was determined to keep the UK, or at the very least Northern Ireland, under the rules of both the EU Customs Union and the EU Single Market in perpetuity, and the EU was prepared to support them on that and in effect allow them to exercise a veto at every stage of the negotiations.
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2018/10/13/tax-and-spend-3/#comment-966230
From November 26 2017:
βBrexit: Remain in customs union and single market to solve border issue, Irelandβs European commissioner tells Mayβ
But I would add a helpful offer to pass a new UK law to strictly control what goods could be carried across the land border into the Republic so as to remove any need for the Irish authorities to check them at the border.
October 14, 2018
After we leave the EU, goods moving from Ulster to Eire represent an importation of goods by an Irish business which will need to be supported by import documentation. Surely, it is up to the Irish government to decide how to deal with cases of non-compliance? In practice, legitimate businesses normally seek to be compliant because non-compliance would represent a significant business risk not only for the importer but also the exporter. However, if there is an intention to be non-compliant, laws will not prevent it: e.g. the soft Irish border has been used in the past for people smuggling as well ‘carousel’ fraud. Furthermore, who would be the final arbiter as to whether goods imported into Eire were compliant, the ECJ? Are we to prosecute a British subject because the ECJ decided his goods were non-compliant?
October 14, 2018
The government want to play this ‘game’ because the government want to stay in the EU. Either that or VERY closely aligned.
October 14, 2018
Yes wrong priorities again.
Last General election the Conservatives gained votes from UKIP and Labour because of her Lancaster House speech, and Brexit means Brexit.
Doubtful if she or the Conservatives could do that again given her performance over the last 12 months.
Only needs a half sensible leader from Labour, and the Conservatives would certainly be toast.
October 14, 2018
@Alan Jutson
Re: “Only needs a half sensible leader from Labour, and the Conservatives would certainly be toast.”
The only way the Conservatives could survive and that is to deliver on their promise, unfortunately it’s looking like toast is what they want, this perfidious PM has destroyed the party.
October 14, 2018
Mrs May is in a tail spin towards earth and taking the rest of us with her, what happen to the No Deal is better than a bad deal speech, we are never going to get close to leaving the dreaded Eu again in my life time, so just force her to leave with no strings or your party will be unelectable for a very long time, time is running out fast so just do it or get rid of Mrs May and get someone in charge who can
October 14, 2018
Dear Mr Redwood.
I have been reading your blog for several years now, and I just want to tell you how refreshing it is to read such common sense views. This particular article I agree with 100%. Thank you for taking the time to update this site as it gives me hope that there are some MP’s who are rational and have common sense.
Please keep up the great work, this country desperately needs people like you right now.
October 14, 2018
Adam, I second that!! Where are the true Tories?
October 14, 2018
Hear, hear.
October 14, 2018
You’re right, Mr Paul. It is balm to the troubled spirit to be able to log into this site every day and read some right-thinking stuff amid all the gloom.
October 14, 2018
You are of course correct to point out Mrs May does not respect, mention or care about England. Though in this she is hardly unique. Of 650 MP’s only about four acknowledge our existence.
The country is apparently made up of Scotland, Wales, N.Ireland and the UK…………….
October 14, 2018
Quite right, very often on various forms such as registering in a hotel it asks Nationality ? followed by a list and there is never ‘English’ only ‘British’ which I point out out to them and just get a confused look in return.
Ask a Scotsman or a Welshman if they are British and see what answer you get !
October 14, 2018
+1
October 14, 2018
Exactly – don’t mention England at any cost is their motto. England’s very existence as a nation is denied by 650 self serving UK MPs for reasons of pure self interest because they know to give England the same rights as the rest of the dis-UK, ie. a voice and a parliament would dilute their own powers and result in a huge cull in their numbers . Instead they try to balkanise our country into competing regions to be governed by UK politicians from across the whole UK. I find it deeply insulting when I hear the dis-UK described as ‘the nations and the regions’, England of course not having nation status. And I find it even more insulting that May is promising even more powers to the devolved nations with absolutely nothing for England, we don’t even get a mention, because of course she and the UK Government will decide what goes on in England as long as they never have to mention England by name.
Shame on them all!!
October 14, 2018
https://englishlabournetwork.org.uk/2018/06/30/speakers-lecture-a-nation-divided-the-identities-politics-and-governance-of-england/
This Speaker’s Lecture by former Labour minister John Denham mentioned England alright, and gave some good examples of how England is written out of our national story, including::
“On Tuesday Gareth Southgate gave a powerful interview in which he said βWeβre a team with our diversity and our youth that represents modern Englandβ and talked explicitly about English identity. The Guardian headline today was βEngland team represents modern Britainβ.
Thatβs not lazy reporting. You have to work extra hard to write England out of the story.”
October 14, 2018
The EU’s plan is the reunification of Ireland. I believe this will eventually happen. The slow process of reunification aided and abetted by the EU as been ongoing now since Major came to power in 1990.
Major, Blair, Clarke and May. All EU placemen and all committed to Irish reunification.
It is the EU plan to surround on two sides the intransigent UK. If the EU can reunify Ireland then that would be achieved. The UK would be gripped in the middle by EU member states.
Of course, this could only happen with the connivance of British politicians from both main parties. The odious Clarke’s reference to wanting to see Westminster to become a mere ‘debating chamber of the EU’ is testament to the wanton hatred of the UK sovereign state and an expression of the end game of the EU
What we are seeing is a continual battle for territorial gains through non-military means. At present the German-EU using its mighty economic strength does have the edge against a divided UK.
What the UK desperately requires is a leader committed to British democracy, direct democratic accountability, the UK’s sovereign nation status and all the controls afforded to it by that state of affairs
If in the future the British people chose to elect a Marxist Labour government using the democratic process then that’s their prerogative and the British people would have to absorb the damage that would be inflicted upon us all. But, the decision to elect would be legitimate, democratic and legal.
We must have direct democracy. We must return to a sovereign UK and stand alongside and equal to other sovereign states like Australia, the USA, China, Malaysia, Iran, Israel, Jamaica, Peru, Ivory Coast, South Africa, Cuba, Canada.
October 14, 2018
You are absolutely right and let’s hope the cabinet follow David Davis’s advice in his article in the Sunday Times today.
We should also never forget the man who put us in this appalling situation Michael Gove who stabbed Boris in the back which opened the door to No10 for Mrs May. We cannot turn the clock back so it is imperative that we turn Mrs May OUT before she brings this country to it’s knees and finally gives in to the EU dictatorship
October 14, 2018
George..you forget that DD was there when chequers was formulated and agreed..he only quit afterwards when he had second thoughts..the same when the agreement was made with the EU last December when the border back stop was agreed..he was the man in the seat..DD the chief negotiator..and now in the Sunday Times today we see he is out to sabotage the PM..He’s just the same as M Gove, a chancer who is in the same class as Boris a boot boy of the old style..not for Britain only always out for themselves and whatever they can screw out of it.
October 14, 2018
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-44761056
“Mr Davis told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that he had objected to Theresa May’s plan at the Chequers meeting, telling cabinet colleagues at the outset that he was “the odd man out”.”
So, yes, he was there, but, no, he did not agree.
October 14, 2018
Davis was overruled by May during early negotiations and deceived during the later part. Your line was also on BBC News review of the papers this morning, when they chose commentators from Remain newspapers. This lie must be coordinated.
October 14, 2018
Navalgazing
Just remember David Davis was under instruction from Mrs May.
As I remember he was prepared to stand firm on many points until May just took over and gave in at each so called deadlock/sticking point.
Who knows what he would have got had we called the EU’s bluff on each occassion.
October 14, 2018
Too many people criticise Davis and Boris for not resigning at the meeting. This is unreasonable and unimaginative.
They were being bounced, and in that situation there needs to be careful not hasty thought about the most constructive response.
They are now being criticised for resigning, because, of course, resigning takes you out of the position in which you can still influence things, as Raab is doing.
In Boris’s case he was also preparing for the Western Balkan summit.
October 14, 2018
May’s behaviour over Brexit is disgraceful and unacceptable. After stitching up the Cabinet at Chequers she seeks to stitch up the referendum result next Wednesday. It is time for Conservative MPs to say No.
I am puzzled why she thinks she can get away with her planned course of action. Does she believe that the majority who voted for Brexit would let her get away with it? I don’t think so. She is on course to provoke the biggest constitutional crisis since the 17thC.
October 14, 2018
She has, I believe, the backing, including financial, of the globalists/deep state behind her e.g. EU funding for propaganda, Soros and others. That is why she seems intent on pursuing the goal of destroying Brexit. She, and they, think they will not fail, but it would be salutary for them to contemplate what happened to Hillary Clinton. She, and the deep state, thought that she couldn’t possibly lose. How wrong they were.
We have a vestige of hope in the UK that Brexit could be saved and democracy upheld if the Tory Brexiter MPs act, and not simply give speeches and write articles. The Tory MPs know exactly what should be done but they apparently lack the courage and lack principles to do it.
October 14, 2018
I do still struggle to comprehend what sort of a person and what sort of a cause warrants the extreme lengths that our PM and civil service are prepared to go to keep the UK in the EU. What is it in the mindset of those who are prepared to throw us headlong in to a constitutional crisis, that says this country should cast aside its liberty for the European cause? Is it about the balance of power in Europe and that the UK’s departure risks unravelling the EU project and the (supposed) protections this set-up affords against future European conflicts? I just don’t know and would welcome JR’s and others thoughts on what exactly it is that underpins Remainers belief that we should be a part of the EU (it seems) no matter what the cost.
October 14, 2018
If you follow the politics in the USA you will know that the deep state/globalists are behind this. Think NWO, which involves the destruction of nation states and the creation of big trading blocs, with policy determined by an unaccountable political elite, who in turn are lobbied by corporate business, the big finance companies, NGOs and so on.
The “ordinary” people are simply the fodder for this whole operation providing the work force to generate the wealth. It must be a work force that is expendable and that can be moved easily to areas of demand, and nothing as minor as national borders or allegiances of any sort can be allowed to get in the way. Hence the cultural Marxist drive to destroy the nation state, and all allegiances binding societies together, including community loyalties and religion, right down to the family unit and gender identity.
There is huge money behind this entire operation and trillions at stake. The population is kept under control by generating divides and inciting unrest e.g. creating bogeymen such as Russia, and inciting wars. The money generated by the military industrial complex, the drug running and the people and child (sex) trafficking runs into trillions, and it depends on global unrest to feed it. Hence deep state operatives are planted to generate unrest and conflict. Think Ukraine, Syria, Iran, North Korea where the artificially created (false flag) pointers are designed to point at Russia.
Putin may be a villain, but he is not the source of our current woes. The deep state globalists trying to impose the NWO are the problem, and President Trump is giving them a run for their money. He is winning. Our politicians are either singularly naΓ―ve and ignorant, or are complicit.
October 14, 2018
A minority voted for Brexit. 28% of the population. 38% of the electorate. Even Patrick Minford style dodgy-maths canβt make that into a majority.
And thatβs where your problem is. The hard-right want to use Brexit to slash our rights and to make their rich friends richer – at the expense of everyone else. You have no majority for that. Youβre not even close.
October 14, 2018
70% of the population did not vote in support of the EU.
October 14, 2018
Is it just coincidentally then, that it is also more people than have ever voted for any single thing in the whole history of the UK?
October 14, 2018
By your own measure a minority voted to remain in the CM/EEC in 1975 – 43% of the electorate (17,378,581 of 40,086,677).
I’m sure you will try to cast that as a majority though
October 14, 2018
Andy
The turnout for the referendum was 72% of the electorate and 52% of those voted to leave
So if there is another referendum to join the EU what are you suggesting as a benchmark to enable it to be legitimate?
90% turnout and 70% in favour?
October 15, 2018
64% of Parliamentary constituencies voted leave and 36% voted to remain.
October 14, 2018
No. It is yourself and all your Brexit Ultra buddies that have damaged the union.
October 14, 2018
Your alternative would be to ignore the majority wish of the Union to leave the EU, then?
Wouldn’t you see this as having a greater potential for fissure than proceeding with the majority wish?
October 14, 2018
Eating baked beans again?
October 14, 2018
Mrs May has been. a disaster for the UK and the Conservative party. Not only has she betrayed us on Brexit, despite her rhetoric, she seems to have no ideas other than being Labour light. The pity is that your colleagues haven’t acted sooner and removed her.
October 14, 2018
Politics in Ireland are complex in both Eire and Ulster. In the south the folk memory of the terrible famine (over 1 million starved) in the 1850’s is very strong and was the prime driver of the 1916 Easter Rising and subsequent secession from the Union in 1920.
The British supported the Unionist side in the civil war of the 1980s – 1990s as the majority in Ulster wished to remain part of the UK – the government had no choice but to support a population that wished to remain British, as they did in the Falklands coflict. The DUP is the largest party in Ulster and firmly wishes to remain part of the Union; following the last general election and the Confidence and Supply arrangement they do have the capability to bring down May’s government should the Brexit agreement with the EU weaken the Union.
What bothers me is the very poor relationship that Mrs May has with the Irish Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, leader of the pro-treaty Fine Gael party. To my knowlege they have never met and do not speak to each other on the phone; this is unprecedented between British prime ministers and Irish leaders since the Good Friday Agreement. The dangers are obvious, particularly since the NI Stormont devolved government has been suspended for months over the issue of the Irish language.
The EU negotiators are using the Irish border to hold up the Brexit negotiations, this is extremely dangerous as clearly Barnier etc wish to weaken the Union, this is anathema to the DUP – Arlene Foster recently met with Barnier in an attempt to break the deadlock and recieved a very hostile response. If another round of sectarian warfare starts over this issue (and paramilitary groups on both sides are already arming themselves and imposing “discipline” on their respective communities) Junker, Barnier, Merkel etc will be to blame.
Theresa May would do well to consider meeting with Leo Varadkar and discussing a way forward out of this impasse.
October 14, 2018
Personally, I would bypass the EU stooge and deal with Mr Coveney, his deputy. He seems to be far more amenable to getting a suitable resolution to alleged border problems.
October 14, 2018
The PM has met the Irish PM on many occasions and would do so as part of the EU in EU Minister Council meetings.
Labour created the problems we now face regarding the Union. They created Parliaments and Assemblies for everyone except the English. The English were offered Mayoral Regions in the North, but they were rejected, only for the Tories to impose them sometime later.
October 14, 2018
According to some predictions UK withdrawal from the EU could cause a greater percentage loss of GDP to Ireland than to the UK itself or to any other EU member state; it seems obvious to me that is why the new Irish government is determined to keep the UK, or at least the very least Northern Ireland, under the rules of both the EU Customs Union and the EU Single Market, and is prepared to use the threat of renewed terrorism to that end; and so far it has managed to keep the support of the EU for its absurd extreme and intransigent position. So I would say that Ireland is using the EU as much as the EU is using Ireland, and both have the covert support of Theresa May who has her own strategy of keeping us bound to the EU as tightly as possible in that “deep and special relationship” she craves.
October 15, 2018
There are ways to support Ireland, as well as justify a regional adjustment fund for countries affected by No Deal (ie no withdrawal agreement along the agreed lines, no transition period and no future relationship worth mentioning) plus a temporary lifting to the growth and stability pact (which would please most members: vote buying galore) plus an emergency funding authority based on EU loans backed by all member states. Maybe easier to do than negotiating with Mrs May & Co.
October 14, 2018
Sakara Gold..no chance..mrs Mays argument is with the EU and not with Ireland..UK started all of this so it’s their responsibility to sort it out..Ireland isnot going to insert itself into the middle of UK Tory infighting
October 14, 2018
SG..β¦.Theresa May would do well to consider meeting with Leo Varadkarβ¦β¦β¦
Unfortunately it does not as though Mrs May likes direct meetings which could prove confrontational and seems to prefer to deal through intermediaries. Witness how it was reported she gave Andrew Marr a very frosty look at the end of their recent interview when he was quite direct with his questioning, rather different from his usual manner.
None of us particularly like contradictory opinions but she does seem to be cocooned with acolytes which ultimately gives rise to the problems she is experiencing over Brexit.
October 14, 2018
What should be patently obvious to the vast majority is that May is hopelessly out of her depth. How she got into any government post is beyond me, never mind organising the biggest operation since D Day.
October 14, 2018
It is not what you know, it is who you know π
October 14, 2018
Indeed out of her depth and with a compass 180 degree out on almost every single issue that matters. Hammond is the same. May the robotic primary school teacher and Hammond the tax to death undertaker or grim reaper.
October 14, 2018
She is not out of her depth but merely a tool of the globalists and apparently only too willing to follow and implement their demands. Howe easy it has been for them, for she seems to have no principles and can lie and deceive, apparently routinely and without any qualms, and mount covert operations against her key Brexit Minister.
October 14, 2018
I’m glad you have mentioned how England is ignored John, not just in the Brexit talks but in everything. It is this betrayal of England by the political elite which will finally break up this so called union.
We hear this morning that the Health Secretary, Matt Hancock (England only) intends to clamp down on prescription charge fraud. As the Head of Pharmacy (England only) has quite rightly stated, this cannot happen in the rest of the dis-UK because of course they don’t pay prescription charges. Instead the idiot in charge of health in England and this anti-English Tory Government would rather pay millions/billions on a new digital fraud prevention system instead.
You’re right about the word England never coming out of May’s lips but then that applies to most of the 650 self serving MPs sitting in the UK Parliament, even those squatting in English seats. The word England isn’t even mentioned in Department names even when more and more departments are becoming English only.
Who can forget May in her duplicitous and deceitful way standing behind a placard ‘Future fit for Britain’ when talking about (kicking the can down the road) tuition fees knowing full well it is only English kids who pay Β£9,250 fees. This after she acknowledged fees (England only) were the second highest in the world again without bothering to say she was only talking about England. Who does she think she is fooling?
Your party is every bit as anti-English as the rotten anti-English Labour Government before it who could only inflict these fees on our kids with the help of Scottish & Welsh MPs and your party, the then opposition, did not utter one word of protest about this affront to democacry.
The anti-English Con/Lab/Lib parties deserve England’s contempt instead of it’s votes.
October 14, 2018
The potency and power of the liberal left construct that focuses on issues such as race, gender and nationality can exert an almost magnetic influence on English based politicians who are petrified of entering into any debate that focuses on issues of immigration, borders, ethnicity and race.
Since May is a liberal left adherent her decision not to discuss these important issues doesn’t and shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone
May’s adept at capitulating to any and all liberal left activist groups. She’ll sell every Tory principle down the river if it improves her personal political leverage
It seems leftist hatred and left-wing bigotry is absolutely justified and moral. The fact that May’s sinister hate crime agenda never targets left wing activists and their violence, intimidation and their bigotry is enough to confirm in my own mind that she’s as liberal left as you can get
October 14, 2018
JoolsB. Correct on every point. I live in Scotland (soon to be leaving for England) and I am sick of the moaning and whining from the Scots when they get so much for free that the English don’t get. Just see where they get with their precious independence. They would soon see where their bread was buttered.
October 14, 2018
Well said.
October 14, 2018
I agree with JoolsB comments 100%. Does Mrs May honesly think she can shackle us to the EU in a never ending customs arrangement. Continuing to pay money into the EU and have no say, staying under durastiction of the ECJ, that we will just accept that outcome. I donβt think so!
October 14, 2018
Well, her own politicians (Tory MPs) are still supporting her. She must be laughing at how easily she has duped them all. They have left it almost too late, and fine words are lost at this stage. Only radical action will suffice to save Brexit and to uphold democracy.
October 14, 2018
”Political elite”? They prove to us every day that most of them certainly are NOT ”elite”!
(Present company excepted.)
October 14, 2018
Indeed yet the Conservative Party in only really strong in England and yet it keeps kicking its core voters in the teeth at every turn. It just does it slightly less than the Corbyn/SNP disaster would do.
October 14, 2018
I noted the figures for austerity that came out last week, where it was reported that English councils had to contend with a 24% cut in funding, where as Scotland and Wales saw a half of that.
October 14, 2018
Plus let’s not forget Hammond managed to find an extra Β£4 billion in the last Government to give to the devolved nations despite them already receiving far more of English taxes per head than the English and that on top of the Β£1 billion bung to the DUP for May’s disastrous election. Meanwhile England’s services are being cut and cut and cut again by this Tory administration.
October 14, 2018
Correction: I meant to say Hammond managed to find an extra Β£4 billion in the last budget.
October 14, 2018
You can have freed prescriptions and free higher education in Engald if you want. But you either have to raise taxes to pay for them – or cut spending somewhere else. And – no – foreign aid and our EU contributions will not come close to covering them.
The only barely untouched area of spending big enough to cut is pensions. I think the state pension should pretty much go entirely. That would pay for the drugs and students you could ever want AND would enable a tax cut for everyone else. But nobody would dare say anything difficult to pensioners.
October 14, 2018
Why should England have to see their taxes raised to receive what the UK Government are supplying free to the rest of the dis-UK courtesy of English taxes?
October 14, 2018
Why are you all so unhappy? Most of you have been Europhobes for your entirely lives and this week you will finally get a Brexit deal. You should be joyous. Weβre leaving, get over it.
But wait. Youβre all unhappy with Brexit. Something you voted for? Remember how you all keep telling me you knew what you were voting for? Apparently you didnβt. Who knew? (Well, me for a start but then Iβm smarter than the average leaver.)
Oh – and you donβt speak for England Mr Redwood. More people in England voted against your party than vote for it. And most MPs in your party do not hold your views.
It is time for Mrs May to end this Brexit fiasco. Fire the Brexit ministers. Expel members of the ERG from the Conservative Party – they are not Conservatives. Invite Mr Corbyn and Cable to form a government of national unity.
Pause Article 50. Set up a Royal Commission to figure out Brexit – and send sensible non clueless political heavyweights to Brussels – John Major, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Nick Clegg, Nicola Sturgeon, Ruth Davidson – to sort out the almighty mess the Tory pensioners have created.
Reply We voted to leave the EU, the single market and the customs union and that’s what we want to do on March 29 next year
October 14, 2018
“send sensible non clueless political heavyweights to Brussels β John Major, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Nick Clegg, Nicola Sturgeon, Ruth Davidson …”
That really says it all.
October 15, 2018
How rude of Andy to Miss Davidson, especially as she is expecting.
October 14, 2018
Reply to reply from Mr Redwood: I notice that now you only say that is what we “want” to do. How tragic that is for Leave voters, but more importantly for the whole country. The fact is that principled, honest Tory MPs do not have the upper hand and they have been outwitted by those intent on keeping us in the EU.
What went wrong, and why? Tory MPs may all be struggling to come up with an answer and will be licking their wounds for months to come, but to the ordinary person outside Westminster the answer is crystal clear. None of you had the courage or honesty to act effectively when it was required (and that was months ago).
October 14, 2018
Sad to say, it seems hardly anyone believes anything Mrs May says.
Is she really as dishonourable as she appears to be? Is she really so lacking in good, old-fashioned patriotism? Or does she consider that a dirty word? Knowing how she is viewed now by the country as a whole, how can you all go on supporting her as someone who represents your Party? Personally speaking, I certainly wouldn’t want someone whose integrity is now open to question leading me. Why is the Conservative party as a whole allowing such a dire situation to continue when there is so much at stake?
So many questions – so little time.
October 14, 2018
May is serving her masters very well, apparently, so “dishonourable”, “patriotism” etc do not apparently come into the equation.
Why does she operate as she does? For globalists, the end justifies the means. Honesty and principle and honouring promises do not come into it. Neither does democracy. I think this is what has completely befuddled the minds of good, honest and decent Tory Brexiter MPs. They could not believe that she (T May) and her advisers and fellow MPs could stoop so low. They kept wanting to give her the benefit of the doubt. Very unwise, and their inaction is likely to mean that they have sacrificed our country to the EU and the globalists.
October 14, 2018
Brexit is now lying face down in the water. Nobody can save it now.
May, and the EU’s plan, to thwart Brexit, has succeeded. Well done…I hope they feel good about destroying UK Democracy.
However, the Tory Party can look forward to ‘reaping the Whirlwind’ at the Polls.
I first voted Tory in the 1970s and have done so, up until the last Election.
I have been a Member of the Tory Party for most of that time.
There are usually 4 Tory votes in our household, from the whole family.
When the next Election comes around, I cannot bring myself to vote for Labour.
So, do I just abstain? No, that’s against my principles, that everyone has a duty to vote.
I shall look for another Party to support. Maybe there will be an Independent candidate? Who knows?
I will definitely be voting ABT – Anyone But Tories.
To the Tories…The Political Killers of Democracy, goes the reward they will richly deserve.
May and the EU have killed off Brexit…It now falls to Tory voters, like myself, to return the favour and to kill off the Tory Party at the Polls.
October 14, 2018
Very interesting comments. I think you will find that huge numbers of ‘traditional’ Tory supporters (and by that I mean ones who have been loyal to the party for decades) will now be looking for a new party to replace the Conservatives. Tory MPs and constituency chairman need to wake up to the possibility that the Conservatives will be blown away for decades, possibly even for good by current events. The PM is playing a very high stakes, some would say reckless game!
October 14, 2018
WeToldYou
Almost in the same position as yourself, only my MP is Our Host, which makes it doubly difficult (as at least he is trying) but after my letters to both the Chairman of the Conservative Party and the Chief Whip gained nothing more than a pathetic cut and paste response after five weeks, which did not even disclose the respondents name, I feel I may be joining you.
Perhaps if May is forced to resign and Brexit is saved, I may think again, but it looks like its too late for all of that now.
The Eurosceptics had their opportunity, but I am afraid they blew it by trusting Mrs May and her fellow Remainer Cabinet Ministers..
October 15, 2018
+1
The triumphant remainers will no doubt blame the 17.4 million who voted leave for the mess they themselves created.
October 14, 2018
The problem with many Scots is they don’t realise what is devolved to their own parliament. They seem to think that every problem they encounter is down to Westminster. Some even think that after independence their state pensions will still be paid by Westminster! You couldn’t make it up. For many of them England is at fault for EVERYTHING. For some their hatred of everything English is so obvious.
October 14, 2018
Dominic Grieve this morning “We are witnessing a country in an act of self mutilation.” and “We are not trying to cheat the public but trying to extricate the UK from the EU intact and without a brutal economic hit.” to that effect.
October 14, 2018
May is sticking to the EU’s diktat of not negotiating with individual states (except Germany, France, Austria….)
It’s up to Ireland/Varadkar to push their/his points via Barnier unless and until Varadkar breaks with the EU. Also in our interest to work round him until that point. He’s presently an EU puppet himself.
October 14, 2018
None of our previous leaders for years have ever come fully to terms with the thoughts on independence by the Scots. When the vote was actually given it was complete panic and man the barricades promise anything to stop them getting what they want.
May has fallen into the same trap as all the other leaders of old. She is, like as with her dealings with the EU showing no signs of real strong leadership vision and total belief in England. She should be making it quite clear of a few of the following facts that should be carved in stone and total non negotiable.
Upon the Scottish people voting and gaining a clear mandate the following will automatically be applied:
ALL MILITARY BASES will be closed and relocated down south.
There will be no shared national grid regarding the constraint payments on renewable energy.
ALL SUBSIDIES payable on all existing windfarms are transferred to Scottish exchequer.
No armed forces equipment constructed in Scotland
The construction of a hard border to prevent illegal immigrants entering England via the back door.
The ginger midge has got to be under no illusion that the Scottish people fully understand the full meaning of being Independent and its full implications on their lives and future.
October 14, 2018
Plus their currency will not be supported by the Bank of England & no Scottish politicians will ever be allowed to sit in the English Parliament.
October 14, 2018
Toady Hancock on Marr with Mayspeak:
“Time limited doesn’t have to be limited by stating a particular time. It can be condition-limited but is still temporary and time-limited”
No it won’t wash with 17.4 million.
October 14, 2018
PPE logic
October 14, 2018
Hancock is not the brightest.
October 14, 2018
Well, for example the condition written into UK law might be that the UK could only be released from the EU’s shackles with the consent of the Irish government.
Which consent might NEVER be given, as Matt Hancock must surely realise; because the Irish government wanted us kept under the EU customs union and single market rules this time last year, and they still want that now, and so why should they cease to want it in ten, twenty, thirty, forty … years?
October 14, 2018
How stupid does Hancock think we are?
October 14, 2018
Paras 2-4, yes, yes, yes. Nonetheless nothing will change. The PM must know that two thirds of constituencies voted to leave, the tactic has been to deliver something worse than remaining to bully people into remaining. Democracy has ended, England is ignored and one Union dominates another.
October 14, 2018
May has charted her course so the question becomes “how much damage is she going to be allowed to inflict before she is stopped?”.
Chuck Chequers now – and its architect.
October 14, 2018
You make pertinent points.
I have come to the conclusion that Mrs May is striving for the worst outcome for the UK. She is a deeply flawed individual, charting a destructive path both for our country and for her party.
October 14, 2018
John, you have nothing left to bargain with, your bullets have all missed the target so far, your hanging on to two handfuls of nothing, that see, rebellion in the cabinet and 9 MPs leave, MAY replace them rebellion over, rebellion on the budget, might not be anything much in the budget to rebel about, rebellion called off, rebellion on final agreement in parliament, labour vote with the gov because it including a customs union rebellion fails, gov and May agreement signed with the EU with no end date, Brexit fails, game set and match to May and gov, John rebels and retires from parliament, rebellion over.
October 14, 2018
Good morning.
A very critical piece on our PM and leader of his party today.
One assumes that the PM is trying to appease to all parties, when in fact, she is using the Remain Nationalist to further the Establishment Remain cause of keeping the UK as closely aligned to the EU as is possible. Hence the faux need to stay in the SM, the CU and non-regression of regulations.
The reason for the above I argue, is so that at some point in time, the UK government will try to rejoin the EU. Only this time we will not have an opt-out / in on the EURO. You have been warned.
Our kind host notices that England is rarely, if ever, mentioned by the PM and other MP’s. This is because it is a UK Parliament and not and English one. I and others here have offered what is the ONLY solution to this. But our kind host does not like it as he sees it, quite understandably, as another layer of bureaucracy. It is a pity therefore that he does not see the partitioning of England into Regions along EU guidelines and the creation of various Mayoralships.
As for the Nationalists. They gave up any idea of true independence when they embraced the idea of the EU and power without accountability. This to me is an absolute betrayal of their supporters and the one that not even they can see, such is their bigotry towards the hated English. I feel for them.
The PM has shown by both weasel words and foul deeds that she cannot be trusted. I can only assume, that just like her predecessor, Edward Heath, a deal will be struck with Labour and others. Such is the nature of politics in this county.
If MP’s do not wish to govern for and on our behalf, then they should stand aside and let others who do do it.
Reply I have always been critical of false regions being imposed on England and worked to get rid of the Regional Development Agencies
October 14, 2018
Reply to reply.
Thanks you. Corrected.
October 14, 2018
I’m just listening to the TV and they are talking about Ireland wanting this and Scotland wanting that etc. Nobody can agree on anything and the amount of debates is becoming boring. For goodness sake, let’s get down to basics. We’ve had the vote and debates should not be necessary. The UK voted to leave. Plenty of people in all the devolved areas of the UK voted to leave. End of. Parliament should not be debating what the people have already decided. They should just implement it. All we are doing is going around in circles and if May keeps us in the single market and the customs union (something she said numerous times would not happen) then we may as well have stayed in the first place. I have never taken part in a vote where the least votes for something one. It’s a bit like the programme Pointless. Pointless!!
October 14, 2018
Sigh. They can not implement what you voted for because what you voted for is economically and politically illiterate gibberish.
Sure you can have your wet dream Brexit. But you can not have it without there being a huge economic hit, without there being more red tape, without us losing huge amounts of power and influence and without it taking away rights and privileges which – when you lose them – it will turn out you actually quite liked all along.
The irony of this is that the people who voted for Brexit will end up hating it most. The rest of us have actually figured out whatβs going to happen to you – and, bless, youβve not realised yet.
October 14, 2018
Andy, it must be great being able to see into the future. Put your crystal ball away and get back to running your fictitious business you go on about. You don’t know anymore than anyone else but at least we have faith in our own country. Sad that you don’t. Why don’t you move to your house in France?
October 14, 2018
I think you’ll find that in every general election in the last 50 years bar 2010 more people voted for the parties on the opposition benches than voted for the party of government.
October 15, 2018
Peter Parsons
Very true
So its a breath of democratic fresh air to have one person one vote, with every vote counting isn’t it ?
Therefore we leave as the demos instructed
October 16, 2018
Libertarian,
Yes, it was a nice change to have a vote where every vote actually counts. The only other time this happens for me is elections to the European Parliament.
The question on the ballot paper said “Leave the EU”. What it did not ask was “how”. WTO terms, Canada (+++) and the Norway model all respect the question actually asked in the EU referendum and the result of the vote, as they all result in the UK no longer being a member of the EU.
As an aside, having lived in a couple of areas of England that voted strongly to leave, I am firmly of the opinion that if the UK had an electoral system where every vote did count then the UK would not be in the position it is currently in as 40 years of successive governments would not have been able to get away with ignoring those areas (as they have no actual effect on the outcome of general elections), which is what those governments of all persuasions have done. The UK is a fundamentally divided place partly because of the FPTP electoral system IMO, and until FPTP goes, it will remain so.
October 16, 2018
Peter Parsons
The last European elections returned a resounding win for leave via the UKIP vote
The questions on ANY ballot paper NEVER asks how
The remain campaign told us repeatedly that a vote to leave meant that we would leave the CU, ECJ, SM and all institutions. Therefore we couldn’t opt for EEA/EFTA . Er there was no such thing as a Canada deal at the referendum the CETA only came in force in September 2017
I dont recall the EU election telling us HOW they intended to carry out our wishes.
I’ve never ever seen an election anywhere that goes into myriad cherry picked detail .
If thats really what you want the ballot paper would be 10 feet long
I agree that our system is totally wrong, but its not FPTP thats the problem its the offset of voting at a constituency level. We need a ‘presidential” style system when we vote directly for a named individual as PM.
October 16, 2018
UKIP didn’t get a resounding win. They got a 27.5% vote share. The majority of votes cast, more than double UKIP’s votes, were for parties advocating remaining at that time.
Elections do go in to myriad cherry picking details – they’re called party manifestos.
I have no problem with a Presidential-style system, but FPTP has to go as well. Any system which has the concept of a vote being wasted has no right to call itself fair and democratic.
October 14, 2018
The enemy of our Union is English Nationalism..in the end it is going to wreck things as we know it..
October 14, 2018
Who are these, “English Nationalists ?” Are they demanding independence from the UK ?
—
That’s all we need, another ignorant (contributor ed)
October 14, 2018
‘Yet in three of her misjudgements’
Let’s assert that May knows exactly what she’s doing and that her actions are not misjudgements but informed, deliberate and planned judgements. That’s not a misjudgement John though I suspect you know that only too well but the code of party politics prevents you from accusing May of a deliberate act of sabotage
She’s an intelligent politician not a naive teenager being led to the slaughter
Please, say what needs to be said and stop skirting around the issue. May is taking a deliberate course of action that will destroy the union.
She is a pure EU political animal. All else is subservient to this
October 14, 2018
Sueddeutsche Zeitung had an ‘exclusive’ yesterday with sight of an internal EU negotiators’ document, saying that the [EU] negotiators want agreement today on the withdrawal agreement, and “THIS WILL BE APPROVED BY THE UK GOVERNMENT on Monday” (sic, my caps). Nothing will be made public, however, until a public announcement by Barnier and Raab in Brussels.
On Friday another Suedeutsche Zeitung article reported an EU source about the political declaration on the future relationship between the EU and the UK (which will only be negotiated after the UK has “left” the EU. The article notes that this political delcaration is not legally binding, and goes on to quote the EU source, “Lots of nice things can be written in there, it doesn’t cost anything”.
October 14, 2018
PS to my comment just now on Sueddeutsche Zeitung article, I see the Telegraph is reporting this too. The Telegraph’s translation/ rendering is wrong, however: “Das Abkommen soll dann am Montag von der britischen Regierung genehmigt werden. Danach ist eine ΓΆffentliche Bekanntmachung ..” That says the UK govt will approve on Monday, and then [time unspecified] there will be a public announcement in Brussels.
In a way, it would be good if the Telegraph’s rendering were correct – it would then be straightforward to vote the Budget down.
October 14, 2018
festina lente, ‘will approve’ should read ‘is to approve’
October 14, 2018
I read that tomorrow Arlene Foster is winging it to Dublin to talk with Leo Veradkar..this must be a first because as far as I am aware such a meeting would not normally be asked for unless the whole talks were in a serious place. My guess is that the EU have spelled it out in stark terms about the border back stop and Foster knows how mrs May is going to go with that when push comes to shove..she mrs May has the votes with the help from Labour to get a deal through..so as a last throw of the dice Ms Foster must be desperate..the thinking is that the checks on goods going to NI will be done in Dublin..so no need for checks in Belfast or on the Irish Border..we’ll know all in a few days
October 15, 2018
Mrs May is more likely to use the SNP than the Socialists to ram this through. The Socialists won’t want to prop her up, though there may be one or two remainers with leave constituencies who might.
October 14, 2018
A message to John Redwood:
I suggest British solution to the back stop.
I suggest the British backstop closest to an agreement during the implementation period is in fact implemented on the understanding it is a temporary solution until such time technology would provide a solution. That way it can be improved by specific experience rather than theoretical agreements that have not been implemented.
We cannot sacrifice the whole for Great Britain for the sake of this border.
This, when modified, could be Britain’s position if we were to decide to Leave without an agreement under WTO
October 14, 2018
I have seen many Prime Ministers and I thought Gordon Brown would go down as the oddest of the lot, but I was wrong. May is unique in that you canβt believe a single word she says and the brazenness with which she peddles her lies is breathtaking. Of course John and all the other Conservative MPs who arranged her coronation as PM unopposed must surely have had some inkling of this ? She seems, as collateral damage to appeasing the EU, not to care that the Conservatives will be destroyed at the next election with demoralised activists refusing to campaign and a voter base who will at best abstain. A pro-Brexit anti-Corbyn Conservative party would clean up, but will there be one to vote for?
October 14, 2018
Given that Mrs May isn’t going to do what you want and that we are due to leave the EU on 29th March next year, you need to depose her by January at the latest. Even more urgent is to put in place a filibuster to block any treaty based on Chequers.
The ball is very firmly in the court of all Brexiteers. There isn’t a moment to lose.
October 14, 2018
Yes, LM, but if press reports are to be believed, David Davis is out to outflank Boris Johnson. Can you believe it? They should be united in working to effect Brexit and not indulge in their own power struggles.
October 14, 2018
JR, I’m glad to see your signature on this letter questioning the Chancellor’s predictions of economic disaster if we leave the EU without a special trade deal:
https://www.economistsforfreetrade.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Letter-to-Chancellor-12.10.18.pdf
“It is unacceptable that the Government leaks the results of its modelling when it suits but simultaneously hides what lies behind these forecasts from the public.”
It may amuse Michel Barnier that the value the UK government places on the EU Single Market is so much higher than the 2% of GDP he himself estimated in 2012:
https://publications.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/c505dbb4-64f1-40a6-8062-ebdea6240bd4
βEU27 GDP in 2008 was 2.13% or β¬233 billion higher than it would have been in the single market had not been launched in 1992.β
Let alone the below average 1% of GDP for the UK estimated in a German study:
https://www.bertelsmann-stiftung.de/fileadmin/files/BSt/Publikationen/GrauePublikationen/Policy-Brief-Binnenmarkt-en_NW_02_2014.pdf
Personally I might choose much stronger words than just “unacceptable” for some aspects of the conduct of Theresa May and her government regarding Brexit.
October 15, 2018
βIt is unacceptable that the Government leaks the results of its modelling when it suits but simultaneously hides what lies behind these forecasts from the public.β
I would say that the Government ‘s “leaks” through the summer of how damaging for the UK would be a “no-deal” (= WTO trade terms) exit has increased the chances of the EU pushing for such an exit.
October 14, 2018
I think we need to remember that despite Theresa Mayβs protestations about defending the union she was only prevented from selling out Northern Ireland last December by the DUP.
Words are cheap.
I hope what weβre seeing with all these leaks and rumors isnβt a bit of play acting so that when the final deal is presented, although bad, will be presented as a triumph of British diplomacy, Game, Set and Match, with Juncker telling us what a tough negotiator Mrs May has again proven to be.
Iβm keeping my fingers crossed that Brussels are so consumed by the need to punish this country that a tipping point will be reached with MPs and ministers to get shot. David Davis as a caretaker sounds an excellent idea.
October 14, 2018
The typical Brexit tales of betrayal. Its never John Redwoods fault hes not getting the Brexit he dreams of, always someone elses fault
October 14, 2018
I agree – itβs not Johnβs fault.
October 14, 2018
The ones who will prove their worth are the ones that take action, instead of just writing about it. The situation is so desperately serious with the future of our country is at stake. There is absolutely no excuse for MPs to stand aside and let this happen. It is war in that we are fighting for the survival of the UK. MPs have to wake up and to act accordingly.
October 15, 2018
Unfortunately not something we can rely on.
October 14, 2018
I gather the 27 ambassadors have been summoned to a meeting in Brussels at 5.30. It looks like the sell out is happening, and Brussels is trying to grab May’s offer before the EU sceptics have a chance to stop it.
October 14, 2018
Well what do you think the little jig at the Tory Party conference was ?
It was a done deal then.
October 14, 2018
Mrs. May, together with a majority of current MPs, simply do not care whether the Union survives as long as the corporates are kept happy by ensuring all the component nations remain in the EUβs CU/SM under the ECJ.
Neither do they care if the UK, or its component nations, become vassal states of the EU.
They are only concerned that corporates are able to take advantage of :
1) FoM to ensure a continuous supply of cheaper EU labour rather than be forced to train UK people or invest in new equipment.
2) UK in-work benefits where they profit from paying lower wages whilst the UK taxpayer pays for all the additional costs of additional schools, hospitals, housing needed for immigrant labour.
3) EU subsidies to move factories to cheaper EU (and even non-EU!) countries partly paid for by the UK taxpayer via our net contribution to the EU budget.
4) Ability to easily move profits out of the UK to be taxed in other EU countries with lower rates of corporation tax such as Mr. Varadkarβs Ireland and Mr. Junkerβs Luxembourg etc.
To achieve this, whilst pretending to respect the referendum result, Mrs. May has invented the N.I. βproblemβ and backstop in order to be able to claim there was no solution but to remain in the CU/SM.
The EU were very keen to agree with this as they saw it would be to their financial advantage, would cause tremendous difficulties for the UK and, in the case of Ireland, might even bring about a united Ireland.
October 14, 2018
Let Mrs May immediately take up a position on the back benches of the Commons, where she can agree or disagree with a new Leave PM Johnson or Rees Mogg. Same for P Hammond.
October 14, 2018
All the talk of a Deal being done today, is just so much media hype.
It is more ‘negotiations’, that’s all.
It doesn’t become a Deal until ratified, signed and agreed by both parties.
There’s a long way to go yet…for Delay, Pay, and Stay, May!
October 14, 2018
When Theresa May talks of her Chequers Plan, I can’t help thinking about Monty Python’s dead parrot sketch.
October 15, 2018
So…once again, what’s your answer to the Irish border question? The EU needs to have customs checks to maintain the integrity of its border. Technology then, the ERG proposes. Which technology, where is is being successfully used, and how will it be deployed on a 320 mile border with hundreds of crossing points? A no deal outcome is the one most likely to weaken the Union. The fact that you’re reduced to attacking ‘enemies of the Union’ shows how desperate you are. Brexit doesn’t work for a such a constitutionally complex nation as the UK. That’s now becoming clear…and yet it never occurred to you Brexit people. Your problem is that none of you is a statesman, able to see the big picture. You’re just a narrow interest group motivated by a desire to create a low-wage tax haven.
Reply Untrue. I want better pay for working smarter, and with colleagues have set out a very detailed answer to how we can work the Irish border.Customs dues will not be collected at the border!
October 15, 2018
“Brexit doesnβt work for a such a constitutionally complex nation as the UK. ”
Nonsense! We managed our independence extremely well between the 12th and 20th centuries, when our constitution (in its various phases) was even more complex than it is today.
If Brexit is challenged, it is by the pseudo-complexities the (unconstitutional) EU brings to the table.
October 15, 2018
Clearly Mrs May, Robbins and his team of Remainer negotiators have been the cause of all the problems over the British position throughout the talks.
I won’t call them “negotiations” because Brussels doesn’t know the meaning of the word.
First May, in an act of brazen duplicity, authorises Robbins to develop a secret, parallel plan behind the back of David Davies leading to Chequers which her own party was never going to accept.
Despite clear warnings she refuses to change tack and we end up with the DUP and 63 Conservatives, including our host, I am pleased to say, firing warning shots all week. May now knows that she can’t get Chequers through even with the dubious support of up to 30 Labour MPs.
Yet, even in the face of all this opposition, Robbins carries on and agrees a deal over the backstop with Barnier’s team, only for Rab and May to have to reject it because she has finally realised that she can’t sell it to her own side.
What chaos, and the responsibility is entirely of Mrs May’s own making !
October 15, 2018
I’m pleased to see that our host has finally taken his gloves off and laid into the Prime Minister as she so richly deserves.
The fact that 62 colleagues have joined him in making a clear and unambiguous statement about Brexit is refreshing. With recent comments by the DUP, it should finally and deservedly finish Chequers for good.
Mrs May’s whole handling of Brexit has been a disaster. Her treacherous behaviour in encouraging Robbins, a mere civil servant, to develop an alternative Brexit plan behind the back of her own Brexit Secretary, and then to adopt it, is surely unprecedented in British political history ?
Hopefully the events of the last week will allow Mr Raab to convince her that a completely different approach is necessary.
The best proof that this is happening would be if Mr Raab insisted that Robbins be forceably retired or moved to a low-level role in an obscure department which has nothing whatsoever to do with Brexit. Hopefully, he will then be prevented from doing any more harm to the Country.
Any suggestions ?
October 15, 2018
A new office for fishing licencing in a shed on Grimsby docks. Second in command.
October 15, 2018
For those who recall ‘The Men from the Ministry’ (1960s/70s, with Richard Murdoch and Deryck Guyler), “Archives at Ballymucky” might be a suitable posting for OR…
October 15, 2018
Please ignore my original. Corrected version below.
Dr Redwood, these three mistakes were not mistakes. It is time the Conservative party ditched the assumption that Mrs May is negotiating for an independent UK. There is only one possible explanation for why a stubborn, strong, intelligent Conservative Prime minister would take UK into a deal with the EU that amounts to vassalage, in the face of opposition from all sides in UK: she believes passionately that the technocratic supra-national government of UK by the EU is better for UK than sovereign national parliamentary democracy.
She is one of the post democracy stalwarts. She sees no value in the sovereign nation state in this post democratic world.
It is time the Conservative party thought hard about Mrs Mayβs motivation β never seriously commented upon. It is always assumed even by her most vocal critics that she is on the side of UK, taken to mean an independent UK but that is not what she has in mind. To her it means supra-national government by the post democracy technocrats of Europe β of which she is a natural member.
Unless she is replaced asap, UK will have to risk short term but repairable damage by a Corbyn government in order to prevent the long term damage to both the UK and democracy which Mrs May is about to inflict upon us and which will endure for at least a generation.
October 15, 2018
J, I understand May is meeting with Sinn Fein today! Could she be looking for support and their 7 votes? Can they still take oath of allegiance whenever they choose?
October 15, 2018
Mr. Tusk has already offered the UK a Canada-style free trade deal.
The current delay in βnegotiationsβ is because Mrs. May is still trying to get sufficient Parliamentary votes from any party for a permanent CU with the EU.
October 15, 2018
Recurring nightmare last night that Mrs May signed the UK into a whole-UK backstop, in the EU customs union.
The EU would have NO incentive whatsoever to conclude a free trade agreement with the UK, ever. Under the likely terms of the agreement, the UK would not be allowed to negotiate/agree free trade agreements with other countries during that open-ended period.
Lunacy.
October 15, 2018
I want to know why the BBC has not presented Nicola Sturgeon with the Scotland “Divorce” Settlement ?
October 16, 2018
Scotland? Where’s that then?
As Clapton said – further on down the road, the island of Ireland will re-unite and Scotland will get their independence. GB cannot refuse NI/ROI a referendum under law.
October 15, 2018
All the argument about backstops and periods seems to be about trade over borders. However, it is the EU that is going to install electronically controlled customs posts all along its Shenzhen borders with the 3rd countries by 2020. We will have to get a visa and pay 7euros.
October 15, 2018
Shengen. My smart altered while capchaing
October 16, 2018
Presumably, Eire will be installing these electronic customs posts at ports now, in time to operate visas for visitors from 2020. Visas and payment will have been under way for some time.They are making arrangements for residents of border areas to have free passes and perhaps the whole of NI could become a ‘border area’.It’s all on the EU’s website, including a video presented by one of the politicians who is whining about the UK causing border problems.
October 15, 2018
No, Brexit has damaged the Union…as was predicted by many two years ago. You can’t pin this one on May. You Brexit people paid no attention to the fact that the UK is a constitutionally complex nation. You don’t know your own country.
October 16, 2018
Precisely! Anyone with respect for our 4-part Union would have stopped pursuit of Brexit when 2 of the 4 voted to Remain
October 18, 2018
If the referenda had been in the reverse order, then the Scottish public would have been faced with the choice of 1) stay in the EU and leave the UK or b) stay in the UK and leave the EU. The result then may have been that 5% more voters preferred the EU so a 2nd referendum is perfectly legitimate.
Notwithstanding that project fear was practiced in the Scottish referendum first – aimed foursquare at pensioners plus the promised Devo-max if Scots vote to remain in the UK turned out to be a base lie. Moreover the majority of Scottish-born voters voted to leave the UK so the decision to include recent foreign and English residents definitely swung the vote from leave to remain. Three more powerful arguments for a 2nd referendum. At the very least, this time there should have been 3 questions on the ballot rather than the simplistic in/out insisted upon by David Cameron.