Parliament votes down the “Stay in and pay up” Treaty

It’s been a disagreeable week in Parliament with endless rows and speculation about what might happen next. The government told Remain supporters voting down the Agreement would lead straight to a  No deal exit, and told Leavers it would lead to a long delay in Brexit. As their WithdrawalAgreement was a guaranteed 21 month delay, a probable 45 month delay and a possible permanent place in the customs union with regulatory alignment they should know about delay. The government was determined to keep people focussed on anything other than the surrender terms of the document, as no one sensible could sign such a document. Why agree to pay whatever bills they send you, and to accept any laws they make without you?

The UK now has just 12 days to decide if it wants to ask for a delay to leaving or else we will just leave. The EU would want to have a reason for a delay, and would insist on us fighting the EU elections in May. As any of the variants so called soft Brexit advocates like would require us to sign the Withdrawal Agreement first this is a bit of a problem. Why should the EU think this government or Parliament could deliver anything, given the track record?

The EU would offer a delay in return for a second referendum or possibly a General election. There is no way Conservative MPs would support either of these ideas, so it is difficult seeing even Mrs May changing her mind to promote them.

309 Comments

  1. Stephen Priest
    March 30, 2019

    Well done for voting down the Withdrawal Agreement.

    Looks like you’ll have to do it again next week.

    1. eeyore
      March 30, 2019

      According to the papers Mrs May is now touting an election. What’s she thinking of – that MPs who keep faith with the people should fear facing them, but MPs who betray them need not?

      Threatening your own supporters and giving hope to your opponents is on a par with her other masterstroke, promising to resign if her policy wins and to stay if it loses.

      1. Stephen Priest
        March 30, 2019

        How anybody would believe she’d resign if the Withdrawal Agreement was voted through is beyond belief.

        All the Remain loving media would be praising her for getting “Brexit” over the line. They’d be saying she was clearly the best person for the next stage for the capitulations, sorry, negotiations.

        1. rose
          March 30, 2019

          I think the tactic was to get her to announce her departure.

      2. Hope
        March 30, 2019

        JR, well done for your speech and vote. The same for the other 28 leavers. Shame on those cowards who changed and gave in. You need to start to get dirty towards remainer MPs on both sides.

        DUP were excellent as normal. Sammi Wilson spot on, Mays servitude plan based on a lie to con everyone made clear by no deal preparations by ROI. May is in collusion not negotiation.

        No deal is the only via option. Well Beaconsfield association no confidence in Grieve. Others need to follow your lead. Guido highlights how Allen lying through her teeth. By election for her Soubry and Wollaston. They are an affront to democracy.

        Johnson, Raab, proved they do not possess leadership qualities and trust will be gone forever with them. Just imagine a hijacking or war with these two in charge! They do not seem to realise that the remainers will still be present for phase two! Does anyone believe for a moment that once phase one has given the EU control over phase two the remainers will not seize upon it?

        Hammond, Rudd, Gauke, Clarke will still be about. Unity leader garb was put out to tempt these fools, it will not exist.

      3. rose
        March 30, 2019

        It is probably “No 10” flying kites.

        1. Merlin
          March 30, 2019

          Interesting of course.

          Does anyone have any thoughts on how we’re going to get this Brexit genie back in the bottle and unite the country again?

          1. Merlin
            March 30, 2019

            And Edward 2. You have me all wrong.

            I’m not a Remainer. I don’t actually care about the outcome of Brexit anymore. I just really want the country to unite again. Any route which can do that I will support, be it No Deal or Remain or anything in between. The lack of compromise on all sides continues to make me unhappy.

          2. rose
            March 30, 2019

            The best way to unite the country is for the losers to concede defeat. That is what has always happened in the past with GEs and referendums. Not once in our history until now has the losing side mounted an obstruction. Now they are destroying our democracy because it depends entirely on the losing side conceding, peacefully and in a civilized way.

            It is a strange coincidence that the same thing has happened in America, in the same year.

          3. Edward2
            March 30, 2019

            Merlin I don’t see how such a binary issue like the EU can have a compromise.
            You are either in the EU or you are out.
            Half in is really still in the EU.
            You either want to live in an independent nation or you do not.

      4. Tad Davison
        March 30, 2019

        Surely not the actions of a rational and reasonable person who is out to win friends and influence people (in a positive way that is. Influencing people in a negative way is her forte!)

        Tad

      5. Chris
        March 30, 2019

        Try reversing what she says in order to gain an idea of what she really intends/thinks. Seems to work rather a lot of times.

      6. rose
        March 30, 2019

        If only she had waged moral blackmail and psychological warfare against the EU as she does against her own countrymen, especially her own party.

      7. Soul Seer
        March 31, 2019

        Election threat, members appreciate how that would work out for them; wlak out for them with the contents of drawers.

    2. Duyfken
      March 30, 2019

      Seconded. Tenacious and consistent. An example to your less than reliable colleagues.

      1. Hope
        March 30, 2019

        Suggest everyone write to their Tory MP and association chair to make it clear the national motion was not to extend and to go WTO.

        It seems Owen Patterson is the only contender for PM with Villiars and Redwood in cabinet. Gutless Raab and Johnson who put their careers before country need not apply. JRM intelligent lovely chap and far too nice but not ruthless enough and is to naive to be near levers of power. Perhaps leader of the House to change standing orders and rid parliament of anyone remotely like treacherous Bercow.

        1. Chris
          March 30, 2019

          I have thought Owen Paterson too, Hope.

        2. Tad Davison
          March 30, 2019

          I wrote to Owen Paterson last night to ask him to consider standing, but I had to be blunt and tell him the situation as I saw it. Perhaps that’s why I haven’t yet had a reply.

          1. Chris
            March 30, 2019

            Also written to OP about the vote yesterday. It was a thank you, but I also made comments about the betrayal of Brexit.

    3. oldtimer
      March 30, 2019

      And thank you, too, to the other MPs who helped defeat the latest WA motion. Last night I was able to watch Sir William Cash’s speech forewarning about May’s intention to bring forward a bill next week, including repeal of the repeal of the 1972 Act. This would be the ultimate act of betrayal of the referendum vote. He pointed out that time and time again the PM, the AG and other ministers have remained silent in response to his questions on this and other pertinent issues.

      The March to Leave rally in Parliament Square yesterday was fully apprised of May’s machinations by Mark Francois. He delivered an excellent speech, as did all the others speaking from across the political spectrum. The message was clear. Whatever MPs think they can decide to frustrate Brexit, the Leave campaign will not go away. Its supporters, judging from the mood, would like nothing more than a general election to express their disgust via the ballot box at the betrayal being planned by the majority of MPs. The late switchers to support the May WA have done themselves no favours in the eyes of these voters. They support leaving without a deal.

      1. Peter
        March 30, 2019

        Mark Francois told us that he used to be a whip, so he knows the ‘machinations’ from the inside.

        Yes it was a very good event. I only found out when I was there that the third attempt at the Surrender Agreement had been defeated. Brexit will be a long war but those present were prepared to do whatever it takes to win.

      2. Julie Dyson
        March 30, 2019

        Agreed. The Leave campaign, far from going away, is growing in strength with each passing outrage. While I may like to think my once-Remainer friends have been persuaded by my own arguments, the truth is more that they have simply opened their eyes to the increasingly obvious bias of such as the BBC, and a heavily Remain parliament doing its damndest to overturn our democratic decision. Those with honesty and integrity know a stitch-up when they see one, and they like it no more than I do: true Brits will not be taken for fools.

        By the same token, while diehard Remainers may gloat like schoolkids that “our march was bigger than your march”, anyone less delusional accepts two important facts:

        1. It was a Friday. Oddly enough, most of us had jobs to do (including the 800,000 who, by “Project BS” projections, should have been out of work as a result of simply voting to Leave back in 2016). Their rally was held on a weekend.

        2. Location. Massively overpopulated London voted strongly for Remain, so many only had to step out of their front door. Indeed, I had to chuckle at that image of the little old lady, laden with her shopping bags, swept up in the throng and carried with the tide, clearly utterly bemused.

      3. Hope
        March 30, 2019

        Time for Soubry and co to ask for by elections now they are a party. Let us see these traitors- to party, voters, associations, manifesto and referendum result-put their case to the electorate and see how they get on. Stop taking the Queens shilling for nothing in return.

      4. Tad Davison
        March 30, 2019

        There needs to be a campaign out in the country to highlight the dangers of the Withdrawal Agreement. Once the people are fully aware how dangerous it is, they will turn against those MPs who would sell them out. They need to know that vassalage is not an option under any circumstances. I bow only to those who hold fast against the evil empire.

        Tad

    4. L Jones
      March 30, 2019

      ”The battle over Britain’s national existence and parliamentary independence is a battle which will be fought through to the bitter end, however long it lasts. It is a battle in which no Quarter will be asked and none will be given. It is a battle in the course of which all other political lines and links will continue to be overrun and broken, as it surges one way or the other. It is a battle in which the bitterest foes of the past will stand together and the closest of old alliances be destroyed…… the fact that the fight is about the continued existence of the nation itself, an issue to which by definition all other Political issues and causes whatsoever must be subordinated, as to the greater which subsumes the less.”

      Enoch Powell. How prescient.

      1. Chris
        March 30, 2019

        Indeed. The globalist One World Government, of which the EU is an integral part, has been years in the making and there are very powerful forces with huge financial resources behind it. That is precisely why we are finding it so difficult to leave the EU as Brexit puts a big spanner in the works with regard to the goal of OWG and has potential to spread the hated (by them) populism and the wish to defend sovereignties/national identities.

        They do not want the populous getting in the way of the grand project so every effort will be made to prevent an interruption to the relentless step by step consolidation of the EU superstate. They proceed by relentless and repeatedly grinding down the opposition, using willing puppets in our government to effect that process. They are deadly serious and I think so many people have been blissfully unaware over the years of the stealthy build up of power and wealth by an unaccountable political elite. They need to be awakened, and thankfully in the last few years it has started to happen.

        The problem is that so much power has been acquired by the global political cabal controlling this that it is going to be a long and difficult fight. However, if President Trump can succeed against the global cabal (and he is indeed draining the swamp and doing huge amounts behind the scenes to tackle their revenue sources gained through drug trafficking, arms trafficking, people trafficking, including children, and money laundering operations which use big Foundations as cover) then there is hope for us. We are not alone but we need a leader who is willing to work with President Trump to get the benefit.

        Reply Most of the global elite condemn criminal activity and are not criminals

        1. Chris
          March 30, 2019

          In my comment above, shoudl read “populus”. Auto correction added the extra “o”.

        2. Chris
          March 31, 2019

          Reply to reply: that is perhaps what we all would have thought. However, I think you may be surprised by the upcoming revelations in the USA with regard to key members of the political elite. There has been significant evidence released already, but a media apparently unwilling to report it. I believe there will come a stage when they will have to report it.

      2. rose
        March 30, 2019

        You can see a video of him and the young Denis Skinner together, to prove the point, while some embarrassing “Conservatives” are on the other side.

      3. Denis Cooper
        March 30, 2019

        Indeed.

  2. Pominoz
    March 30, 2019

    Sir John,

    Your piece today conveys so clearly the underhanded and duplicitous nature of the PM’s approach to this critical situation. All we can hear is “What can be agreed before 12th April to solve the Brexit issue?” The EU chiefs seem to be insisting that whatever happens in the future, the putrid WA must be part of it. An emergency summit is being called so that they can agree the next step! Do we not have a say?

    It appears there may be plans by TM to get MV4 by putting a choice to MPs of Her WA versus the most popular of yet more indicative votes. It is like a recurring nightmare. What happened to leaving with No Deal on WTO terms? Even now, the benefits of a clean Brexit are not being promoted, but let us hope that this remains the legal default and is not over-ruled by the EU or overturned by traitors in Parliament.

    At least Donald Trump is openly declaring he is ready to do a trade deal immediately we leave the EU. Shame he cannot be seconded into Parliament to take control of our departure. I bet we would be out on 12th April if he were!

    1. DaveM
      March 30, 2019

      We’d have left a year ago if he’d been in charge, probably with a lump sum FROM the EU.

      1. Lifelogic
        March 30, 2019

        Indeed. This government has failed us dreadfully and has been further undercut by the remoaner MPs who have given the EU little reason to offer a sensible deal.

      2. Chris
        March 30, 2019

        plus lots of other extras. He is one tremendous President. Many of our politicians have so much to learn. They need to demonstrate some humility and employ some wisdom pdq.

    2. Anonymous
      March 30, 2019

      Frederick Forsyth outlines in the Express this week the shadowy seven Civil Service figures who really run the government. He has had a tip off from an insider.

      It answers why every which way we vote we get Blairism and more Cultural Marxism.

      1. Chris
        March 30, 2019

        I believe they are really low level operatives for a global political cabal – some call it the deep state – that has a goal of One World Government.
        The EU, and similar constructs, are an integral part of this agenda.
        (Also see the UN Agenda 21, renamed 2030 I understand. It makes very worrying reading)

        These supra national blocs require surrendering of sovereignty, and handing over of powers to a political elite, who are unaccountable. Mass movement of labour, and large supplies of cheap labour are essential to generating wealth in this globalist model.

        It is based on Communist principles, hence Gorbachev’s astonishment at us trying to create another Soviet Union with Europe.

        There is huge wealth and ambition behind the drive towards One World Government, and the fact that the people of the UK were upstarts and voted to leave the EU, is, in their minds, a fairly minor irritation which can be swatted/stamped out fairly easily. Having a europhile PM in charge of negotiations with mainly Remainer Ministers, and definitely Europhile civil servants has made the job easy. Just grind the upstarts down and keep making them vote. Fund the Remainers to the hilt and create further strife and division. Tighten control of the media and internet.

        The whole battle to get out of the EU is hugely significant, and Brexiteers are up against a very big and powerful and well funded opponent. I think many MPs have little idea of the power of the globalists/deep state who will stop at nothing to fulfil their dream. P Trump is a very big fly in the ointment for them. The UK upstarts are small fry. You never know though….We might manage to surprise them all.

      2. Robert mcdonald
        March 30, 2019

        Brown made it known that he was ensuring senior appointments in public services were “suitable” to progress his political ambitions .. i.e. only left wingers need apply.

      3. James
        March 30, 2019

        34 Conservative MPs (including our host), and a handful of other MP’s did not falter. They had the guts to stand fast and refuse to vote for a measure that they considered dishonourable to our country. They will rightly be recognised as heroes and heroines in the future.

        1. John C.
          March 30, 2019

          I fully agree.

          1. Chris
            March 31, 2019

            Agreed, James. Hugely significant too as it gives people hope. All we need are a few good men. They have the potential to move mountains. We shall see.

    3. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      Traitors. I am so glad JR still allows contributors to use the most appropriate language. I hope he doesn’t bottle it like some radio presenters I could name. The word ‘traitor’ isn’t just appropriate, the betrayal of the UK to the EU by its elected representatives should stand as a case study in treachery.

      Tad

  3. Peter Wood
    March 30, 2019

    ir John,
    In normal times and with a normal PM your logic is sound. We do not have a normal PM so the decision she will make is to take the course that keeps her in No. 10; what’s best for the country is not relevant. Mrs. May IS the problem, when will you Tory MP’s rid us of her?

    The correct course for Parliament on Brexit is to proceed with the last decision that it made that passed both Houses and became law. Time is up.

    We are starting to see the voter backlash; Mr. Grieve is finding out the cost of his hubris. Remainer MP’s in Leave constituencies should take note.

    1. Anonymous
      March 30, 2019

      Doubtless Remainers will be triumphant at the small turnout of Leave marchers compared to theirs.

      Marching and street protest is not how we do things. We’ve always done it by the ballot box.

      What I see, hear and feel in my own life is disengagement from politics by at least 50% of the population, “Our vote makes no difference anyway.”

      They are waking up to the fact that there is no point in voting for mainstream parties and next election we’ll see what students and extremists bring us. Because that’s all who’ll be turning up.

      1. Timaction
        March 30, 2019

        Small turn out?? No it was…..huge. I was there. Great to be amongst fellow Patriots. Unashamed to be called British Patriots!

      2. Dave Ward
        March 30, 2019

        “Next election we’ll see what students and extremists bring us. Because that’s all who’ll be turning up

        That’s my greatest fear

      3. vera
        March 30, 2019

        That is the problem. I can quite see people reasoning that it is pointless voting since it makes no difference to the outcome, I entirely sympathise, BUT do not think that will bother them – it won’t! They will just win every referendum, every election, every vote – is that what you want? And then they will say, why have elections or referendums at all when the population clearly are not interested? You will have proved their point, Result – democracy dead for sure, dictatorship or autocracy reigns.

    2. Steve
      March 30, 2019

      Peter Wood

      “We are starting to see the voter backlash”

      You ain’t seen nothin yet.

      1. Turboterrier.
        March 30, 2019

        Steve

        Correct and some

    3. Leslie Singleton
      March 30, 2019

      Dear Peter–How soon can they throw Grieve out preferably on his backside?

    4. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      I agree, but she’s one of a large number of clones who seem to be of the same mind. They need to be de-selected. And the grounds and justifications are there. Disloyalty to this nation is abhorrent and should never be allowed to prevail.

      Tad

  4. Mark B
    March 30, 2019

    Good morning, and thank you once again to our kind host for his efforts.

    Today should have been the first day of our freedom from EU rule. What it shows is, that the impediment to this is much, much closer to home than we think, and it is there where we must seek change. Alas that will not be for some time.

    So the saga continues and parliament will be made to vote again and again until it gets the ‘right’ answer. For that is the EU way and clearly our government and PM serves their interests and not ours.

    Alexander Johnson is just a careerist politician and, in my opinion, is equally unfit to be PM as the current one. The last thing we need is a rampant careerist at the helm.

    J R-M is just disappointing – end of.

    Only our kind host sees things as clear a day. Keep your nerve and run this right up to the Europarl elections. No matter how many extensions it takes, make the country sit the Europarl elections, it is the only chance we will get of showing our displeasure, and a final Agincourt Salute to the EU.

    1. Hope
      March 30, 2019

      It will also give the brexit party time to grow. Unless no deal is delivered the Tories are done.

    2. Leslie Singleton
      March 30, 2019

      Dear Mark–Am I alone in wondering what would be so very dreadful about taking part in the European Elections? Is it just that the main parties fear Nigel Farage and, apart from any effect he may have, being in any event eviscerated and perhaps destroyed for what they have done? Cannot see why anybody away from Parliament should worry.

    3. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      If we do endure the elections to the EU parliament, I hope all pro-EU parties get wiped out, and we elect the most disruptive, loudest, argumentative, and condemnatory people these islands can produce. So to the EU lackeys who read this blog and report back, I say make sure you get in Tusk’s earhole and don’t keep anything from him. He needs to know our anger and displeasure!

      Tad

  5. APL
    March 30, 2019

    JR: “It’s been a disagreeable week in Parliament with endless rows and speculation about what might happen next. ”

    And made yourselves look like a right rabble too.

    Even if May does get an extension, what can she negotiate in two months that she couldn’t manage to negotiate in two years?

    Let’s just bite the bullet and leave.

    1. Turboterrier.
      March 30, 2019

      APL

      Even if May does get an extension, what can she negotiate in two months that she couldn’t manage to negotiate in two years?

      Three fifths of naff all that will remotely benefit this once great country.

    2. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      APL,

      The term is ‘manufactured prevarication’. May has used every trick in the book to delay, all the time looking for an opportunity to deny the people what they voted for on the 2016 referendum.

      Most other people could have done the job of leaving far better and in a far shorter timeframe. Just think if she’d been given a majority. We would already be signed up to perpetual vassalage by now.

      Tad

  6. Yorkie
    March 30, 2019

    Most voters of all parties, I guess, feel as they feel after a General Election where their vote was defeated. Except in the case of we Brexiteers where every single day since the day after 23rd June 2016 has been defeat heralded as progress to victory. Now delay is also seen as victory. If we never leave we will be drunk celebrating into our old age daily

  7. Mrs Alison Houston
    March 30, 2019

    May is determined to bring the blasted thing back for a fourth time. Please spend the next few days talk g to the idiot leavers who backed it this time and persuade them that they must not back it next time.

  8. Mike Wilson
    March 30, 2019

    I see a newspaper headline this morning saying something like ‘May says one more vote or it’s a general election.’

    Does she need, under the Fixed Term Parliament Act, two thirds of MPs to agree to holding one? For many Tory MPs, it would be like turkeys voting for Christmas. Given that the Tory Party is now a rudderless ship where the crew have mutinied, surely the majority of them will not vote to hold an election. They wouldn’t be that daft, would they?

    1. Mike Wilson
      March 30, 2019

      Meant to add that Dominic Grieve has lost a vote of confidence held by his local party. Presumably deselection looms. I can see the Tory vote collapsing at the next election. Tory voters will never vote Labour but a lot of people are now saying ‘I’ll never vote again’

      The Tory Party have allowed May to completely mismanage leaving the EU and in the process of doing so will have destroyed the party as a credible party fit for government.

      Seriously, it’s time to revoke Article 50 and get back to trying to be a credible government. You could reasonably make the argument that ‘it’s causing too much dissent and taking up too much time, we’re going to abandon it and let the people decide if they want to vote for a party with Brexit in its manifesto at the next election.’

      It would all be forgotten in a few weeks and we could all get back to normal.

      1. Paul H
        March 30, 2019

        Dream on.

        1. Mark B
          March 30, 2019

          Agreed. It seems the Remainer ploy is to get Art.50 repealed.

      2. Pud
        March 30, 2019

        Mike, don’t you see any drawbacks to the government letting the voters express their opinion via a referendum and promising to implement the result and then failing to carry out the voters’ instructions?

        1. Mike Wilson
          March 30, 2019

          Well, yes, of course there are drawbacks. But I have to say I am past caring. Anything that is likely to happen is worse than remaining. So, let’s just remain.

          1. Edward2
            March 30, 2019

            Odd logic Mike.
            Why not try leaving the EU like the referendum result demanded.

      3. L Jones
        March 30, 2019

        Don’t you remember that we voted in 2017 for parties with ”leave” in their manifestos? And much good did it do us. What ever makes you think it would be any different next time?

      4. MickN
        March 30, 2019

        Mike the vast majority of us voted for a party with Brexit in it’s manifesto last time. Where did that get us?

      5. JPM
        March 30, 2019

        So,you are proposing that having won a referendum and a general election where 85% of votes were cast for parties who “committed” to leave the EU, leave supporters should now win a third vote before their voice is heard?

        And what then, best of seven if they win again?

      6. Denis Cooper
        March 30, 2019

        I’ve noticed that with you it always comes back to revocation of the Article 50 notice, whatever spurious preamble you may construct to justify that.

      7. Helen Smith
        March 30, 2019

        Lol, you can’t really think that 17.4m people would just shrug their shoulders and say ‘ah, well, we tried’ can you, let me guess, you voted Remain.

        1. Tad Davison
          March 30, 2019

          I hope they wouldn’t shrug it off Helen. We need to stand firm and shout ‘betrayal’ from the rooftops. I heard Heseltine on the radio this morning criticising Nigel Farage’s speech yesterday. Heseltine would have it that leavers now meekly go away and leave things as they are.

          I am all for people like Nigel Farage, and after this latest U.K. parliamentary betrayal, I would walk with him through the gates of hell!

          Heseltine is the one who should go away and fade into oblivion. He’s of the ilk that perpetrated the ultimate EU con in the first place.

          Tad

          1. John C.
            March 30, 2019

            Tad, quite right. All the problems we have had have been caused by the refusal of remainers to accept the result of the referendum, starting with May herself, who was so apologetic in asking the EU for anything that they treated her basically with contempt.

          2. Fedupsoutherner
            March 30, 2019

            Tad, you’re a man after my own heart. 3 cheers for Farage.

        2. margaret howard
          March 30, 2019

          Nor will 16.1m remainers.

          1. APL
            March 30, 2019

            margaret howard: “Nor will 16.1m remainers.”

            What an overtly and profoundly undemocratic remark.

            By the way, We’re still waiting to hear how the UK is a net contributor to the European Union, but gets back more than it pays in.

            That’s fairly rudimentary arithmetic. You should be able to give an explanation?

      8. rose
        March 30, 2019

        And we know Conservative voters would let in Corbyn because they nearly did last time. I know lots who refused to vote for Mrs May and her mad manifesto.

        1. vera
          March 30, 2019

          They won’t be voting Labour either. They can’t be trusted either. They’ll be voting Leave. For UKIP or whatever other Leave party there is.

      9. graham1946
        March 30, 2019

        I was one who earlier said I would never vote again. I qualify that now. I will now never vote Tory, Labour, LibDem again. The Greens are loony, so if there is no independent or Brexit candidate, then I won’t vote again.

      10. Ginty
        March 30, 2019

        Dominic Grieve is saying the local party should be sacked.

        How very EU. Politicians more important than the grass roots that put them there.

        1. Chris
          March 30, 2019

          Ginty, that reported statement by Grieve defies belief. Does he really understand how appalling that sounds? Does he not realise that he has just provided splendid political party broadcast material for an election campaign? It could not illustrate more clearly the huge gulf between a political elite and the populus, and the supreme arrogance that comes with having too much power. He has to be made accountable for what he has done, which is to betray the promises to his constituents and to have obtained his post as their MP under, basically, false pretences it seems.

      11. Chris
        March 30, 2019

        MW, I understand that CCHQ “manages” deselections and I suspect the establishment will try to keep him in place.

        Cue for all the pro Grieve comments by MPs about how many years of service, honourable man, served on this and that committee, former AG and so on. The one glaring thing that they fail to acknowledge is that he won his vote on false pretences. He was fighting the election on the basis of the Conservative manifesto which included honouring the Brexit vote. Then what did he do? To so many in the electorate he appeared to relentlessly overturn and undermine the referendum result, and mastermind strategies with a group of Remainer MPs including Soubry to engineer effectively the defeat of the Brexit vote.

        That was disgraceful and I believe that if the constituents do not want or respect that behaviour in their MP they should be able to get rid of him. It will be difficult. I believe that CCHQ stepped in with regard to Soubry, and the local Chairman was the one that was sent packing.

        1. Al
          March 30, 2019

          “I believe that CCHQ stepped in with regard to Soubry, and the local Chairman was the one that was sent packing.”

          Sadly true. CCHQ judged her loyalty to the party very well, and she has repaid them with due gratitude for the faith they placed in her. After all, why should CCHQ risk losing an MP, when they can lose an MP and a loyal chairman?

    2. Anonymous
      March 30, 2019

      General election ? Bring it on.

      I relish not voting Tory this time. Some deserving target to lash out at.

      (With regrets to our host and a dozen or so exceptions.)

    3. Turboterrier.
      March 30, 2019

      Mike Wilson

      They wouldn’t be that daft, would they?

      The way they have presented themselves up to now, please don’t hold your breath

  9. Everhopeful
    March 30, 2019

    The situation feels a bit Ground Hog Day like.
    As we approached the 29th we thought there were certain procedures that could not easily be circumnavigated. ( Making a No Deal more likely).
    Hey ho…secret letters etc. And why did all 27 approve a delay?
    Will Mrs M just keep on and on and on doing anything to get that Dead Dodo Deal through??

    1. Stred
      March 30, 2019

      Everhopeful. They all agreed the extension because they all want the money for the increased budget.

      1. Tad Davison
        March 30, 2019

        That sounds highly plausible.

        Tad

      2. Everhopeful
        March 30, 2019

        Stred
        Ah..thanks! Hadn’t thought of that!
        Follow the money then?

    2. vera
      March 30, 2019

      That’s what they do in the EU – you keep having to vote until you come up with the correct answer – obvious that the EU is ruling Mrs May – France, Ireland, Denmark have all gone through this and caved in eventually. Mrs May needs to go now – and if we get a General Election, so be it – lets get shot of all those traitors in Westminster.

  10. Everhopeful
    March 30, 2019

    Good grief!
    What’s all The fuss about anyway?
    Its only a TRADING block not an empire that we want to leave….oh errrrrr….ummmmm!

    1. Stephen Priest
      March 30, 2019

      Apparently to trade the clocks can’t change in March and October, all new cars should have speed limiters on them, all US technology companies should be fined on a whim for no obvious reason apart from the fact that they are American. And finally all decisions should be made by unelected bureaucrats.

      You can’t trade if you don’t have any of the above.

  11. Gordon Nottingham
    March 30, 2019

    What is wrong with our PM? We NEED to leave NOW. No DEAL, No 39 billion and no more votes.

    1. Brigham
      March 30, 2019

      Unfortunately we have elected people that have no regard for democracy. These MP’s should be booted out at the next general election. This includes the PM.

      1. Enrico
        March 30, 2019

        Totally agree.

      2. Turboterrier.
        March 30, 2019

        Brigham

        we have elected people that have no regard for democracy.

        The majority do not even understand the meaning of the word.

      3. L Jones
        March 30, 2019

        With Grieve’s fate in mind – can a Prime Minister be deselected?

    2. Mike Wilson
      March 30, 2019

      It will cause catastrophe, apparently. It won’t, of course, but that is ‘the narrative’.

      What it WOULD have caused is the Tory Party to split. But now that Dominic Grieve has just lost a vote of confidence held by his constituency members, other Remainers May well be thinking twice.

      I heard yesterday that Remain cabinet members will bring the government down if we leave with no deal. It’s OVER! The Tory Party is finished. If we leave with May’s deal, hard Brexiteers will bring the government down. If we leave with no deal. Remainers will bring the government down. What a farce. And it all seems from having the wrong Prime Minister. The Tory Party is now a laughing stock.

      1. Lifelogic
        March 30, 2019

        Certainly it is the BBC endless narative for both a WTO Brexit or indeed climate alarmism! Which will get us first I wonder?

        1. Chris
          March 30, 2019

          We are now in minus territory, Lifelogic, with global warming. Catastrophe should have taken place a few years ago apparently.

      2. Chris
        March 30, 2019

        MW, I don’t think the Brexiteers would bring the government down. That is the difference between them and the Remainers.

      3. Tad Davison
        March 30, 2019

        The last time the Tories lost their credibility (1997), it took 13 years to get it back, and even then, they only managed a coalition with a party that should have been their sworn enemies. The public clearly didn’t totally trust them and it was only the dire incompetent Labour government under Gordon Brown that gave the Tories a chance or they would have stayed in the wilderness for even longer!

        So how might it play out this time after the mother of all betrayals?

        The Tory party are slow learners. This truly is an existential threat to their very being. They need to deliver on the referendum, and that requires strong new leadership backed up by a purge of all those limp lettuce pro-EU MPs who should never have been there in the first place.

        Defeat is not inevitable, but it will be if the Tories keep on giving us this contemptible trash.

        Tad

      4. vera
        March 30, 2019

        Can you bring the government down by seeking to trash the Tory manifesto?
        All those hopefuls wanting to be PM – do they really think they are up to it?
        The Tory party is finished (almost?).

    3. Andy
      March 30, 2019

      What is wrong with no deal? It is genuinely difficult to know where to start with such a monumentally daft question. So how about turning it on its head.

      What is right with, overnight, instantly removing swathes of the laws, structures and agreements on which society is based?

      It is like playing Jenga and you deciding – on your first go – to remove most of the bottom room. The tower might stand. It probably won’t.

      1. Anonymous
        March 30, 2019

        “What is right with, overnight, instantly removing swathes of the laws, structures and agreements on which society is based?”

        So three years wasn’t wasted then.

      2. Ginty
        March 30, 2019

        The Chancellor refused to provide funds for preparations for leaving the EU without a deal. The only literal interpretation of what was on the ballot slip.

        For this the Tory party deserves oblivion. The majority of them need to make preparations for NOT being politicians after the next election.

        Start arresting people and there will be civil war.

      3. Jagman84
        March 30, 2019

        All laws are being retained through the great repeal bill. Had we left without a formal deal, as scheduled, at 11pm last night, nothing would have immediately changed. This was to avoid the mythical cliff edge, held so dear by extreme remainers. Or crashing out, as the MSM state with no supporting evidence.

      4. agricola
        March 30, 2019

        In two words very little. Historically we were quite good at producing an equable society via Parliament and law. There is a Bill pending to transfer all law acquired from the EU to the British statute book on our departure. So what is your problem, best not answer that one fellow contributors.

        What you do in your leisure time is your business, but if you are going to insist on similies let it be something with which we are familiar.

      5. Edward2
        March 30, 2019

        Andy
        Did you miss the bit many months ago when the Government said it was transferring all the important parts of law into the new independent UK’s law when we leave.

        1. graham1946
          March 30, 2019

          He doesn’t do facts, does our ‘Fact Free Andy’ so don’t try to confuse him with them.

      6. Helen Smith
        March 30, 2019

        But that is not what would happen, all those laws have been rolled into UK law, and we have a load of mini agreements to cover aviation etc. What it would mean is we would be £39bn better off, immediately regain our fishing rights, and could immediately sign FTAs with the growing economies of the world.

        Equally importantly, we would have delivered on the result of the referendum as democracy and fairness required.

        1. Andy
          March 30, 2019

          I am genuinely almost wetting myself with laughter.

          I really want you guys to try out a no deal.

          See how it works out for you.

          The trade deal with the Faroes will save you!

          1. agricola
            March 30, 2019

            It will work much the same as the 60% of our trade we already do under largely WTO rules. I should add that this trade with the World is in profit wheras EU trade is in defecit.

            Don’t let reallity distract you , you keep us entertained with your submissions from the dark side of the moon.

        2. margaret howard
          March 30, 2019

          If we renege on the money we owe no one in the world will want to have anything to do with such unreliable, dublicitous ‘partners’.

          The so-called fishing rights were in fact allocated and sold by our own fishermen in search of a quick profit. So if they want them back they would have to buy them with no guarantee that the present owners would be open to offers.

          1. APL
            March 30, 2019

            margaret howard: “The so-called fishing rights were in fact allocated and sold by our own fishermen in search of a quick profit. ”

            Incorrect.

            British fishermen were persecuted by our fisheries ministry to the extent it was better for them to sell on their licences. They were effectively forced out of their ancestral waters and industry by their own government.

        3. Dennis Zoff
          March 30, 2019

          Helen Smith

          Quite right.

          Let’s boil Democracy down?

          Stage 1. The majority voted to leave, therefore we leave. (mimicking a General Election).

          Stage 2. Once the UK has left the EU, what is life after our departure? If indeed it is disagreeable, vigorously predicted by Remainer naysayers, then we move to Stage 3.

          Stage 3. Everybody has the right to vote again for a return to the EU.

          Democracy in action….or is this way too simple?

      7. a-tracy
        March 30, 2019

        Andy, why would we instantly remove the laws and structures?

        We would keep them and review them and change them in time.

        On your Jenga analogy what the WA sought to do was immediately pull every other piece out of the bottom two rows, then tell us we could only pull out the sticks with our strongest hand tied behind our backs. All it gave us was a bill and doesn’t guarantee anything.

        We are saying no, we are British we want a fair way to proceed forward, i

        1. Andy
          March 30, 2019

          Yeah – but you seem to think you are the only one playing Jenga. I’m afraid you are not. You are relying on others for your tower not to fall.

          You’ll find that being British does not help you.

          1. a-tracy
            March 31, 2019

            We elected the Conservatives who forged an alliance with the DUP who elected May without a membership vote to play Jenga on our behalf.

            I think you’ll find being British this state of unfair play will not help you in the long run.

    4. Lifelogic
      March 30, 2019

      Indeed. But May is wrong not just on Brexit. Her economic policy, tax borrow and waste policy, her red tape spewing policy, her expensive energy policy, her gender pay reporting agenda, her HS2 and green crap biofuel lunacy, her choice of a tax to death chancellor and dire Governor of the BoE, he project fear agenda, Hinkley C, her prices and income controls, her attacks on movers, landlords and tenants…..Get the sensible Mervyn King back please. Replace May with a real Conservative, small government, Brexiteer please as soon as possible.

      Hopefully D Grieve, Ken Clarke, Hammond, Hunt and the rest of the remainers will be deselected before the next election.

      We are in this position due a total failure to prepare fully for no deal (in the nearly three years that we have had since Cameron decided to call the referendum). Hammond is particularly guilty here. Had we done so a sensible deal would certainly have been offered. It was Gross Negligence. May has created chaos.

      1. Lifelogic
        March 30, 2019

        The BBC continues it’s blatant anti-Brexit agenda, still at least 4 to 1 in interviews and discussion programmes. The Interviewer’s questions hugely biased with a constant assumption that Brexit will be hugely economically damaging or a cliff edge. Morgan, and Benn on just now. Never any discussion of the huge advantages of leaving it is a net benefit by a long way.

        “Only a revolution can fix our politics now
        I have never known such anger at our political class. Both parties are hopelessly adrift from their supporters” – says Nigel Farage in the Telegraph.

      2. Lifelogic
        March 30, 2019

        Juliet Samuel in the Telegraph says “Brexiteers share the blame for this almighty mess”. Was she a fan of the EURO and ERM too I wonder?

        Complete and utter tosh. The blame lies with Appeaser May (for being absolutely hopeless and for incompetently throwing an election) and especially with Hammond (and the civil service) for competely failing to prepare for a WTO brexit or to fund such preparations, the BBC and the government for it’s absurd & endless project fear agenda, the speaker and remoaners for ensuring that the deal offered is so dreadfully appalling and Gove for knifing Boris and making us suffer May.

        The Brexiteers who foolishly caved in on May’s deal yesterday do certainly deserve criticism. Almost anything is better than May’s non Brexit deal.

        A great shame May seemed not to understand reason, leadership, visions, logic, negotiation, numeracy, business or game theory.

        1. Am
          March 30, 2019

          Correct.
          We needed Farage in Westminster. He, unbound, by party loyalty, could have grabbed the moment.

          1. margaret howard
            March 30, 2019

            The only loyalty he has is to Nigel Farage.

          2. Edward2
            March 30, 2019

            Farage gave up a lucrative City career to form UKIP and campaign for leaving the EU.
            He has had attacks abuse threats and more.
            He is far more properly motivated than a lot of MPs I could name.

      3. L Jones
        March 30, 2019

        Can a Prime Minister be deselected?

        1. Chris
          March 30, 2019

          It would be very satisfying to have a countrywide referendum on confidence in our PM. Sure, it would only be “indicative”. What if they did not like the result? Perhaps they would tell us that we didn’t really know what we were voting for.

  12. Stred
    March 30, 2019

    They will do as Tusk suggested and agree a long delay but bend the rules again and not allow the election of British MEPs, as requested by May. Neither can risk the Brexit Party and Ukip gaining seats. Then the next stage of the plot is to have the usual second referendum in which the right sort of people will be give a choice of remaining or not really leaving.

    1. Caterpillar
      March 30, 2019

      Stred,

      I agree with the implication. If there is an extension UK must vote in European elections, the PM is trying to avoid this as it will be a clear signal that she is wrong and a loud voice will be there to be heard. It is a threat to her and party. With the case of a GE she can frighten some of her own MPs.

  13. Paul H
    March 30, 2019

    And yet it seems that May is determined to continue her disgraceful “I only have to get lucky once” strategy – straight out of the EU playbook, of course. And it seems that no-one can stop her doing so.

    1. Lifelogic
      March 30, 2019

      She seems to be an EU puppet dancing as instructed!

  14. javelin
    March 30, 2019

    My message to your readers is that The dictatorship only lasts until the next election.

    1. anon
      March 30, 2019

      No they will remake elections based on regions. Regions will be smaller and they will continueto respect any non compliant votes by allowing infinite opportunities to vote the right way. They would no doubt rerun the general election ! EU law supercedes any elections.

    2. Timaction
      March 30, 2019

      It’s slow death of the legacies. Good. They so thoroughly deserve it. Who would ever vote for them again?

    3. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      I hear you, but the problem is, we keep voting Labour or Tory like some revolving political door, hoping without any real justification things will be different this time.

      With the odd exception, I would keep most MPs as far away from the levers of power as possible because they’re downright incompetent and scary. If these two parties can’t (or in May’s case won’t) deliver, we need a brand new party free from all mistakes and indiscretions, that will deliver.

      Time is quickly running out for this government, so the message is, give us complete severance and do it quick. Then we might believe on them. May’s assurances are meaningless and Cringeworthy. As things stand, I’ll be chasing Tory, Lib Dem, and Labour canvassers out of the gate!

      Tad

    4. vera
      March 30, 2019

      That is not the reality of dictatorships. The reality is that there are no next elections, ever.

  15. Kevin
    March 30, 2019

    If it is the definition of insanity to do the same thing over and over and expect a different response, it is the definition of weakness to give a different response when presented with the same deal over and over.

    Thank you for not being weak.

    I fully expect Mrs. May to launch another pre-emptive strike on our exit date by attempting to bind us in international law to a new one without first seeking parliamentary approval via a new statutory instrument. Godspeed to anyone prepared to face her down this time.

    1. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      What is it with a Prime Minister who wishes vassalage for her country, and what is it with MPs who support her in this evil quest and vote for it?

      Tad

  16. Richard1
    March 30, 2019

    I assume parliament would even vote to revoke article 50 at the 11th hour if there was no Deal. The EU know this and might let things run to see whether that Happens.

    A delay of even 2 years would be better than the WA – the transition period is just delay but with no votes while giving up any negotiating advantage. Mrs May should go and beg for an extension, which the EU will grant at the last minute. She then needs to go immediately and a new PM should go back to square 1 and propose an FTA with WTO brexit as the alternative.

    Mervyn King spoke very sensibly on this on the Today programme yesterday.

    1. Denis Cooper
      March 30, 2019

      I repeat that the UK Parliament, the domestic legislature, cannot revoke the Article 50 notice; nor can it apply for a further Article 50 extension, nor negotiate changes to the Withdrawal Agreement, nor undertake any other such diplomatic activity; these would be actions on the international plane, and falling within the ambit of the UK government, the executive. And to repeat the words of Gladstone to the Commons in 1855:

      http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2019/03/29/another-day-yet-another-debate-on-brexit/#comment-1008228

      “Your business is not to govern the country but it is, if you think fit, to call to account those who do govern it.”

      Theresa May should not be allowed to shuffle off her responsibility to govern on behalf of the Queen by just mechanically doing whatever MPs may vote for; she can and should take into consideration the views of Parliament but if anybody is going to revoke the notice or apply for an extension then it will be her, not MPs.

    2. Dave Andrews
      March 30, 2019

      Agreed. The WA is worse than remaining. Leavers need not fear losing Brexit, as the referendum result stands for any future government to act on. In the meantime, grumbling about the EU will fester and Farage has got a big mouth.

    3. William1995
      March 30, 2019

      Wishful thinking I fear. May has no incentive to leave in that scenario. If she resigns before getting some form of Brexit, she will have nothing to show for her time as PM. From her perspective it would be better to stick around until something happens. Even if it ends up being second referendum etc.

    4. Lifelogic
      March 30, 2019

      Indeed get Mervyn King back and kick (PPE) Carney out! He is still only 70, far better, has principles was about 1/3 of the price too.

      1. Mitchel
        March 30, 2019

        He wouldn’t be allowed to come back.Unlike Carney,he’s not one of the chosen ones sent amongst us to “do God’s work”.

        (Great interview with Nomi Prins,author of Collusion -about the collusion between the central banks with their GS appointees-on the Keiser Report today)

    5. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      ‘A delay of even 2 years would be better than the WA’

      This is precisely what May and her disgusting team of pro-EU lackeys want. She could have given us much better terms long ago.

      People are altogether too kind towards her. I saw through that woman a long time ago when she exaggerated a laugh by juffling her shoulders and slapping her thighs. Absolutely as false as hell. And now, the Tories AND the country have been bitten.

      They have got to get rid before this goes on any longer and she gets another chance to do for us all.

      Tad

  17. agricola
    March 30, 2019

    You will not get clarity or direction until you rid yourselves of this catastrophic PM and conservative leader. Virtually all the possible replacement candidates blotted their credibility when they voted for the toxic 1/2 WA. yesterday. There isn’t a figure advocating leave who stands out from the rest.
    The few who have stuck to their beliefs, like yourself, are considered unelectable. In a left wing leaning conservative party I’m afraid they are. My conclusion is that a swamp clearing general election is the only way to achieve a conservative government of one mind that actually represents those who would support it.

    1. agricola
      March 30, 2019

      PS.
      I have just heard that Dominic Grieve has lost the confidence of his local conservative constituency party. Indicative of the way the swamp can be drained. Predictably the conservative party in the HoC do not like it. Tough get used to it, you could be next.

      1. Lifelogic
        March 30, 2019

        Who next Morgan, Rudd, May, Hammond, Clarke x 2, Jo Johnson, Greening, Philip Lee plus 2/3 of the Cabinet …. quite a long list.

      2. Lynn Atkinson
        March 30, 2019

        We have 28 Tory Diamonds. We will hang onto those thnak you. The rest – well looks like Tatton is lost again!

        1. Chris
          March 30, 2019

          They are indeed diamonds, LA.

    2. Anonymous
      March 30, 2019

      General election. Yes please. Quickly.

    3. a-tracy
      March 30, 2019

      Philip Hollobone needs to step up.

    4. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      I am all for a swamp-clearing GE, but the problem is, thereafter, the local constituencies keep awarding the candidacies to yet more of the same left- leaning PC pro-EU BBC-think chinless wonders!

      I heard The Tory peer, Baroness Wheatcroft, on the radio yesterday speaking of Margaret Beckett as a national treasure. How in the hell did she get to be a Tory peer with judgement like that?

      It seems anyone with a plummy accent who is pro-EU is in with a chance. Yet another swamp that needs draining, but that lot cannot be got rid of through a democratic process.

      Tad

  18. Mick
    March 30, 2019

    I was hoping to have of got up this morning with one hell of a hangover after celebrations last night to have our freedom after nearly 50years in the dreaded Eu but no it was not to be , well not this time, we can only hope now that April 12th is going to be the day we leave unless there is some underhanded plot to keep us in for months more, but that wouldn’t be advisable with the mood of the nation

  19. Danmore
    March 30, 2019

    the EU backroom boys have already decided 12 days to go and we’re out. There is no chance they will agree to an extension that would mean elections in UK for the EU parliament and then maybe sixty seventy odd UKIP/Tory disgruntled types sitting there disrupting things at every turn for the next, how many years? no chance- so rest assured.

    1. Denis Cooper
      March 30, 2019

      Thanks for that vital secret information from the back room …

      1. Bellboy
        March 30, 2019

        Denis .. it’s not a secret..they are saying it openly now in Brussels and Strasbourg

        1. JOHN FINN
          March 30, 2019

          They are saying to put the frighteners on our weak-willed parliament. It will work.

    2. rose
      March 30, 2019

      Tusk and Frau Merkel think otherwise and they usually get their way. Where does Rutte stand on this now?

    3. vera
      March 30, 2019

      I’m afraid you are very wrong. The EU won’t let us escape, they need our money. And when the EU collapses they want to take us with them. Once we are in for good, they will asset strip us.

    4. margaret howard
      March 30, 2019

      Mind you, they will miss that clown Farage. Nobody else to entertain them with his glorious rants now.

      1. Edward2
        March 30, 2019

        If the Euro elections happen in the UK there will dozens more anti EU people elected.
        And looking at the rise of anti EU parties in continental Europe there will be lots more from their elections too.

        1. margaret howard
          March 31, 2019

          Name me a single EU country in recent years that has voted in an anti EU party. Even the Greeks know it is the EU that saved them from total collapse.

          1. Edward2
            March 31, 2019

            That is not what I said Margaret.
            There is a rise of parties in Europe that are anti EU.
            It is predicted that these parties could win over a third of seats in the next EU elections.

          2. Tad Davison
            March 31, 2019

            You really have just got to be joking! What do you know that the former Greek finance minister, Yanis Varoufakis doesn’t?

            You need to listen to him before you spout such uninformed drivel in future. Your cherished EU stitched Greece up!

          3. rose
            March 31, 2019

            When President Macron visited us he was asked by a broadcaster about France and the EU. He answered, surprisingly frankly, that they would vote against the EU so he wasn’t going to give them the chance.

      2. Tad Davison
        March 31, 2019

        For all your bluster and inaccuracies, I bet you dare not get into a proper debate with him!

  20. John Sheridan
    March 30, 2019

    Many people owe you and your colleagues who voted against the WA a debt of gratitude. The pressure to rollover must have been quite intense.

    I would like to think that Mrs May would give up on the flawed WA, but I think that is wishful thinking on my part.

    1. MickN
      March 30, 2019

      I realise the pressure being brought to bear on MPs and see that Messrs Raab, Rees-Mogg, Johnson etc are saying that we should bank the May deal and push on for change later. Well sorry Gentlemen, but if the EU allowed change we would not in all probability have voted to leave. I believe that in recent years the UK have taken a stand on an issue within the EU and every single time it has been voted down. Blair gave up a large chunk of our rebate in return for a change in the CAP. After they had pocketed the money there were no reforms as promised. Cameron went with a virtual begging bowl and came away with a “there there” pat on the head. Anyone who thinks you can change the EU has not looked at the history.
      The EU had better be careful what it wishes for too. It would be better for them to cast us adrift than have 70 odd MEPs elected who’s sole aim will be to join with other Eurosceptics from other member states and destroy the whole rotten empire from within.

  21. […] One speech was by Sir Bill Cash who spoke excellently as Chairman of the EU Scrutiny Committee. Here is a brief clip, an answer on the question of the Backstop. The other was by Sir John Redwood – watch him here – who came to a totally different conclusion on the same question faced by JRM. Nobody can say that JRM must have been ignorant of these views. Btw, do read Sir John Redwood’s Diary entry for today!  […]

  22. Mike Wilson
    March 30, 2019

    Including May the last 3 Prime Ministers have left / will leave Downing Street with their career over and their reputation in tatters. Who will be next?

    Vote Corbyn, get Venezuela.

    1. rose
      March 30, 2019

      Macmillan, Heath, Mrs T, Major, Cameron, Mrs May – all brought down by the EU. You would think the British people would have learned the lesson by now, which is that a divided party and a divided country cannot survive against this protection racket and bunch of rule breakers.

  23. Denis Cooper
    March 30, 2019

    It is quite staggering that the most popular choice among MPs involves the UK seeking a future relationship with the EU similar to that presently suffered by Turkey.

    Before and during the referendum campaign the idea of becoming like Turkey was attacked by some on the Remain side as well as by some on the Leave side, and after the referendum it was still being generally dismissed as a bad choice.

    As an example which quickly comes up on google, by the Centre for European Reform in December 18th 2016:

    “Customs Union membership is no way out of the Brexit trap”

    “Customs union membership would also force the UK to try to copy EU trade deals with other countries. Turkey must offer countries with an EU trade deal tariff-free access to its market. But those countries are not bound to reciprocate, and may charge tariffs on Turkish exports unless Turkey manages to negotiate its own bilateral deal.”

    Later today I will go back in my files to remind myself how the Labour party was edged step by step towards its present ludicrous policy position, so that its MPs would vote to inflict this on our country, and how the government signally failed to knock their crazy ideas on the head. It hardly needs to be said that it largely started off with the nonsense about the Irish land border.

    1. Caterpillar
      March 30, 2019

      DC,

      Paragraph 1 agree, it is bewildering. (I think there is a lack of understanding from many MPs).

      1. rose
        March 30, 2019

        Surely it is a ruse? To get us to accept the CU which doesn’t entail Free Movement, and then push on the back of that for the Single Market? Thence back into the EU via a second referendum putting just those two options: SM and CU versus full membership.

    2. William Simpson
      March 30, 2019

      I agree with you, and have written it repeatedly in the various comments forms on the subject. I simply do not comprehend how those who have a clear understanding of the Withdrawal Agreement, and who have vehemently opposed it because of its dire consequences for the United Kingdom, on so many levels, can now “hold their noses” and overlook those consequences, to simply “get Brexit over the line”. Once approved the treaty might get Brexit over the line, but at a cost that is far too high; in fact worse. Even intelligent and clear-sighted people have lost the plot over this. It’s a suicide pact, that the signatories from UK have no right to involve the British nation.

    3. rose
      March 30, 2019

      Quite right Denis. When Norway and Switzerland were betrayed by their politicians they were put in the Single Market and Schengen but they weren’t put in the Customs Union.

      1. hefner
        March 30, 2019

        Rose, you might want to look at Wikipedia. For example, “Switzerland-European Union relations” details the bilateral approach followed by the Swiss and the referendums at the various stages of the process. Last one of importance was on 5 June 2005 to accept entering the Schengen area agreement.
        There is a similar information available for Norway “Norway-European Union relations”.

    4. graham1946
      March 30, 2019

      Don’t bother dusting off old files, Denis. We know how Labour came to its present absurd position – pure opportunism, hoping to get a GE. No principles involved, they follow the Groucho Marx line, ‘If you don’t like my principles, I have others’.

    5. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      We’re constantly in your debt Denis.

  24. ukretired123
    March 30, 2019

    If only TM understood how important it is to have “Street Cred” – you either have it or you don’t. You cannot ”bolt it on'” like when she did her dancing act to lighten up at CPC.
    I think she led a sheltered life in her parents Vicarage and with her husband. If she had teenagers they would have been mercilessly ribbing her behaviour and pulled her in different directions. However it is sad she does not have this blessing and maybe Andrea Ledsom tried to make a similar point.

    1. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      And for a vicar’s daughter, she has a strange affinity with the truth!

      1. rose
        March 30, 2019

        One could write a book on the children of the clergy, starting with Branwell Bronte and ending with Gordon Brown and Mrs May.

  25. Andy
    March 30, 2019

    The UK has clearly decided that it does not want to leave at all.

    All the evidence now shows that public opinion has swung decisively against the Leave cheats.

    I am still hoping for a hard Brexit so we can destroy the Tory party once and for all – and so we can lock up its proponents. Who, helpfully, include nearly all of the Tory MPs who need locking up.

    Incidentally a Times journalist has claimed that trade experts have been brought in and will next week hold seminars for some Tory MPs to explain to them what a customs union is.

    Incredible.

    1. Anonymous
      March 30, 2019

      Our host knows what a customs union is.

      Do you think he should be locked up ?

      Do you think he cheated in the referendum ?

      1. Anonymous
        March 30, 2019

        PS, I don’t understand why political union must be essential for trade.

    2. Ginty
      March 30, 2019

      Start arresting people and you will get civil war.

    3. Dominic
      March 30, 2019

      You need help

    4. Jagman84
      March 30, 2019

      I’m cool with a hard exit as it’s what I voted for and is probably the one action the could save the Tories from annihilation. Thanks for your always-wrong political analysis. It’s always good for a laugh. Mainly at you, obviously!

    5. Rien Huizer
      March 30, 2019

      Andy,

      You are ignoring the Comres polls, commissioned by such non-partisan papers like the Express and The Telegraph. According to those, patriotic spirit and desire for independence are even stronger than in 2016.

      But of course, of the appr 34 million people who voted about exiting the EU, around 1.5 million have passed away*) and at least 1.5 million fresh voters have entered the contest. If we keep asking people how they voted, that gives misleading results. People probably stick to their more contested beliefs (remainers stay remainers and leavers, leavers) but the sample changes, which poses a challenge for pollsters, and one that grows. In 2016 appr 50% of Britons voted and in a hypothetical rerun or different-but-same-subject that might be the same.

      *) 533K in 2017 according to official statistics. That 1.5 million is highly concentrated among the 55+ portion, where “leave” polled over 65% in the referendum. The real question is not if the younger half of the electorate have changed their minds (the appear resigned but no necerssarily turned) but to what extent the cohorts moving into the 55+ bracket as replacements for the deceased and incapacitated elderly, would vote like their predecessors. I guess no one knows and polling specifically to identify that kind of movement seems pretty tacky to me. No doubt private polls do this, but the would not be published. Also, the results would require a very large margin, relative to the demographic effect.
      But the result would be very different if the UK would be staying in for a couple more years (as envisaged effectively by the WA) or the next two years would be under hard brexit conditions. Those planning the Tory Party’s future must make a good guess to set brexit policy (from a Party interest point of view of course).

    6. bigneil
      March 30, 2019

      ” has clearly decided that it does not want to leave at all. ” – -Really? – did we have another referendum while I was having an afternoon kip?
      “All the evidence ” – -you provide none, so I assume you are respecting ( the very busy ) John’s recent request to only send short posts.
      ” so we can destroy the Tory party once and for all ” – Sounds like a nice chap.

    7. Steve
      March 30, 2019

      Andy

      ” The UK has clearly decided that it does not want to leave at all.”
      ” The evidence now shows that public opinion has swung decisively against the Leave cheats.”

      1. The result of the entirely legal and fair referendum still stands.

      2. What ‘evidence’ ? can you prove it ? is it unbiased ?

      3. It is not leave doing the cheating, as you well know.

      4. Neither is it leave doing all the moaning and crying, and behaving like a bunch of spoiled brats.

      “I am still hoping for a hard Brexit so we can destroy the Tory party once and for all”

      Personally, I doubt you could destroy a crisp.

      “Who, helpfully, include nearly all of the Tory MPs who need locking up.”

      Grow up for heavens sake !

    8. Richard1
      March 30, 2019

      Should all the remain advocates be locked up if we leave and it works out fine & all the project fear lies are exposed as falsehoods?

      1. Steve
        March 30, 2019

        Richard1

        “Should all the remain advocates be locked up if we leave, and it works out fine ?”

        Even if we did try to lock them up when we leave, most if not all of the cowards would suddenly have converted from remain. The remain advocates in Westminster would have done a runner anyway whether we leave or not.

        Treason would have been the mechanism to deliver justice, however, funnily enough Blair repealed the treason laws. (now why would he do that ? something to do with lying to HoC, Queen and nation perhaps ?)

    9. graham1946
      March 30, 2019

      You seem obsessed with locking people up, but provide no clue as to how it might be done or what laws have been broken (other than lying and broken promises, which is par for the course with MPs). Don’t you ever get fed up with being proved wrong about everything with your Fact Free posts?.

    10. Charles Crane
      March 30, 2019

      Hey Andy, are you really James O’Brien in disguise?
      You sure as hell sound like him.
      He talks rubbish too.

      1. Steve
        March 30, 2019

        Graham, Charles

        It’s pointless putting questions to Andy, he never replies because he can’t substantiate anything he says. Reason – it’s all crap.

    11. acorn
      March 30, 2019

      Andy, you will read that the EU Consilium has again had to explain to the UK, that there is no “transition period” with a “no deal” Brexit; and, there are no “mini deals” other than the 14 short term cushions, that are solely for the benefit of the EU27.

      I quote: “A “no-deal” scenario on 12 April is now a likely scenario. The EU has been preparing for this since December 2017 and is now fully prepared for a “no-deal” scenario at midnight on 12 April. The EU will remain united. The benefits of the Withdrawal Agreement, including a transition period, will in no circumstances be replicated in a “no-deal” scenario. Sectoral mini-deals are not an option.”

  26. A Northener
    March 30, 2019

    Fair play to you Mr Redwood on your correct and principled stance against the WA. Sadly, the next set of indicative votes will show a Parliamentary majority for a Customs Union and we’ll end up with a sort of WA- (WA with Customs Union tacked on). This will satisfy May because it’s where the backstop was leading anyway as she well knows, and will delight the EU whose so-called ‘threats’ about allowing a so-called No Deal are a bluff. (The EU are terrified of No Deal, not because of any supposed economic harm, but because it gives the UK its independence). WA- will also satisfy many in the Labour Party.
    Those who say the most important thing to May is hanging on to office are mis-reading her. Her ultimate goal is to deliver a remainers non-Brexit on behalf of the likes of Mr P May. She’s going to get her way.

    Reply The WA gives you a cusroms union as well

    1. A Northener
      March 30, 2019

      Yes, I know.
      But formalising it via an ‘indicative vote’ will provide the cover for voting through the WA for Labour MPs. They can claim it as a ‘win’.

    2. Denis Cooper
      March 30, 2019

      There was a chap on TV saying that the EU would probably be prepared to revise the deal to keep us in a permanent customs union. Well, what a surprise, most likely the EU would be prepared to accept something that was significantly to their advantage and hugely to our disadvantage … and this is what the patriotic Labour party wants, and it is what they mean when they say that Theresa May should drop her red lines so that there could be a new negotiation for a “softer” form of Brexit.

      1. A Northener
        March 30, 2019

        Mr Cooper, I’m afraid that’s where we’re heading after the next ‘indicative votes’ on Monday.

      2. Steve
        March 30, 2019

        Dennis

        That said, I will laugh my b****cks off if the EU says ‘that’s it no extension’.

        Just have to wait till the 12th to find out what other dirty tricks and cavalier attitude to UK laws might emerge during the next couple of weeks.

  27. Max Joseph
    March 30, 2019

    I look forward to John’s constructive engagement with the parliamentary process to find a compromise that will avoid throwing the baby out with the bath water. It might not be the brexit he wants, but that is part of living in a parliamentary democracy, isn’t it?

    Maybe then it will finally become clear that a majority of people never wanted his form of brexit in the first place.

    1. Lynn Atkinson
      March 30, 2019

      Oh yes we did – and that is the only option now. Remain or leave – the people made that decision. Parliament dare not contradict us!

    2. Dominic
      March 30, 2019

      There are no degrees of Brexit though I suspect you probably know that anyway. It’s either independence and sovereignty or it isn’t.

      There’s no halfway house and to present this as a possibility is the very height of deceit

    3. Jagman84
      March 30, 2019

      In a binary decision such as this, there is no compromise to be had. The shambles of the indicative votes illustrated that. MPs need to accept the referendum result or reap the consequences of not doing so.

      1. Steve
        March 30, 2019

        Jagman

        While I respect your views, mine is that the cons & DUP should stand firm, and take us to the 12th with a no deal exit.

    4. Andy
      March 30, 2019

      I do not much like Tony Blair – but he has had it right from the start. He has made clear that there are actually only two types of Brexit.

      A highly damaging Brexit – which will harm our economy, reduce growth for decades, isolate Britain and reduce us on the global stage.

      Or a pointless Brexit – which will see us have to follow or mirror lots of EU rules but with no say.

      Eurosceptics have not worked out which of these to pick.

      1. acorn
        March 30, 2019

        Continentals are telling me that the big four in the EU27, are looking at a German forecast that says 750,000 skilled and semi-skilled workers, presently in the UK, are more likely than not, to leave the UK in the three years post a “no-deal” Brexit; and, will mostly be looking for better opportunities within the EU27.

      2. Steve
        March 30, 2019

        More crap – don’t you ever give it a rest?

    5. Edward2
      March 30, 2019

      They certainly don’t want the Withdrawal Agreement.

    6. Pominoz
      March 30, 2019

      B****cks

    7. Ian wragg
      March 30, 2019

      There’s nothing left to compromise. The WA is total capitulation with Brussels firmly in the driving seat.
      It makes us a Colony of the EU.
      This is unsustainable and will cause massive unrest in the country.

    8. graham1946
      March 30, 2019

      In normal circumstances, maybe, but in this instance, Parliament couldn’t make up its mind and asked the people what to do. We told them. We don’t give a stuff what MP’s opinions are, they should just get on with it.

    9. Helen Smith
      March 30, 2019

      Of course if Remain had won 52/48, we would now be discussing whether to go for hard or soft Remain because we wouldn’t want the tyranny of the majority. If we have a second ref which is rigged to Remain we will no doubt have all these arguments, won’t we?

  28. Chris Dark
    March 30, 2019

    Bringing this dog’s breakfast back to be voted on again is utter insanity. Mrs May is denying reality…..that she LOST! Not once, or even twice but three times. This whole multi-voting thing ought to be illegal. She should be ousted, she is not fit to run anything. The WA ought to be dead, but it seems to be imbued with everlasting life!

  29. Dave Andrews
    March 30, 2019

    What on earth is going on in the heads of those Conservative PMs I thought were sound? Davis, Raab, IDS, JRM, all voting for the ghastly Withdrawal Agreement. Have their family been kidnapped for ransom?
    PM can now look forward to doing the walk of shame again in just under 2 weeks. How much humiliation can she suck up?

  30. RichardM
    March 30, 2019

    This works both ways. There are many ERG MP’s in remain constituencies with huge numbers of their constituents (larger than their majorities) who have signed the petition to revoke A50. Most don’t have huge majorities like in Wokingham, where a penguin wearing a blue rosette would still win.

    1. hefner
      March 31, 2019

      I had never heard it with a penguin, that’s a nice one. What I heard recently in my small part of the Wokingham constituency was “a broomstick with no bristles but a blue rosette” would get the Conservative vote. Which was not a nice way to characterize Sir John the Inflexible’s efforts!

  31. Steve
    March 30, 2019

    Well written analysis Mr Redwood.

    However re your last paragraph; we have seen Parliament and the Conservatives simply change laws to suit themselves. So I wouldn’t rule out more of the same.

    In theory we should be leaving without deal on 12th April, but don’t hold your breath as there will likely be more dirty tricks to come.

  32. Sir Joe Soap
    March 30, 2019

    Thanks for sticking with this, when many drifted away to vote with their perceived majority in the party and against the people. Perhaps consider joining the Leave means Leave speaker roster?

  33. Pete Else
    March 30, 2019

    This government and parliament have achieved a remarkable feat. They have managed to make the EU look competent and reasonable in comparison with themselves. I didn’t think it was possible but by a combination of greed, stupidity, corruption, cowardice, lying and incompetence they have done it. May has done even better. She has put herself in the running for worst prime minister ever, which given the competition includes Brown and Blair is quite an achievement.

  34. Lindsay McDougall
    March 30, 2019

    How much of the £39 billion exit fee arises from the 21 month transition period? If there is No Deal, there is no transition period, so presumably the payment due is much less. Has anyone got the figures?

    1. Chris
      March 30, 2019

      Yes, LM, the European Commission in its statement immediately after the vote said that there would be no transition period with No Deal, the latter now being a “likely scenario” to them.

  35. Woody
    March 30, 2019

    Maybe we have been giving May less credit for political cunning than she deserves … by any measure she was always talking up her determination to leave the EU as the public was promised, leave the single market, the customs union, the EU legal regulatory system and its money taking system etc… yet it is becoming clear that all the time she has been working with the eurocrats and her own bureaucrats to con us into signing up for life to the eurocracy with absolutely no powers. You can fool some of the people some of the time, but even remainers must see the facts now surely.

  36. Adam
    March 30, 2019

    Whereas Mrs May may be opposed to a General Election, MPs could force one via non-cooperation, paralysing her ability to remain in power.

  37. Nigl
    March 30, 2019

    And presumably members of the Cabinet who sat on their hands whilst this shambles evolved will be touting their leadership potentials in the coming weeks and I suspect somehow spinning that it is a bad deal, they can improve it and that is what they thought all the time.

    When we talk about MPs paying for what they have done with their local associations, let no one forget who sold us out at executive level, Gove, Leadsom, Javed, Mordaunt, Gauke etc and ensure that they too pay a heavy price in the form of having any PM aspirations put straight in the trash, for their disloyalty to both the Leave vote and the Manifesto they signed up to.

    I wish I could refer the words ‘Right Honourable’ to Trade Descriptions.

  38. A.Sedgwick
    March 30, 2019

    Steve Norris very eloquently in about three minutes on Talkradio yesterday detailed May’s shortcomings as a politician, “leader” and negotiator. Anyone who knew her over the years was aware of her personality. Brexit has exposed the deep flaws in our political system, not least the fallacy that FPTP gives stable government.

    He also stated the obvious that at the outset we should have prepared for WTO, also giving the EU our terms for an agreement, including of course a unconditional free trade agreement – take it or leave it.

    May’s track record would indicate a second referendum or general election are very possible.

  39. Doug Powell
    March 30, 2019

    Is this PM for real? She is just arrogance piled upon arrogance! The conventional wisdom is that if you are in a hole, then stop bloody well digging! But she orders more shovels by the truckload! Has she no pride, or honour? Doesn’t she realise she is wrong? – obviously not, everyone else is out of step except her! Can’t she see continued grovelling to the EU is humiliating herself and the Nation?

    If a deal cannot be done with the EU in 2.5 years, any extra time is pointless. Well past time to call the EU’s bluff! State that we will trade on WTO terms after 12th April, unless the EU would like a free trade deal with the UK – I believe we would see an rapid change of heart from the EU.

    And all this talk about participating in the next EU elections has to be STOPPED!

    Is there no one who will rid us of this troublesome PM?

  40. George Brooks
    March 30, 2019

    The Remainer MPs are wrecking this country. They have been tagged as the ”political elite”. They are not, they are the ”commercially ignorant”. A high proportion of them have never been in industry or commerce and have no idea what makes this country tick. If they did, the idea of a delay would be off the table and we would be going out on April 12.

    Two weeks ago we all thought that we would be leaving on 29th but a quick trip to Brussels by the PM and with the flick of a switch the leaving date set in law was moved by the EU and our law stood for nothing.

    Now the PM tells us that ‘No deal’ has been voted down and that must be obeyed. Rubbish, it should be treated in exactly the same way as the leaving date.

    In the coming 10 days all ERG and similar minded MPs need to ensure all the Letwyn et al ideas get thrown out to illustrate to the EU that we want ”OUT”. We have to have a clear demonstration of non cooperation so that the EU let us go. They have a huge back log of problems that Brexit has pushed out of the way plus an election.

    The longer this state of affairs continues the EU’s problems get worse and more damage is done to this country. Have another delay and the EU won’t be worth staying in and we might be too weak to get out.

    We are entering the ”last chance saloon.

  41. ian
    March 30, 2019

    For people interested in what MPs and parties think of manifestos, go to BBc I player HARDTALK Tuesday night, interview with KENNETH CLARKE.

  42. Rien Huizer
    March 30, 2019

    Mr Redwood,

    “Why should the EU think this government or Parliament could deliver anything, given the track record?”

    Why indeed? Hopefully the UK public will realize that “the EU” “wants” the UK to stay in the Union. Officials who talk that way are merely polite and diplomatic. Should there be trouble down the road after a disorderly exit, do not blame the Europeans. They simply follow rules once written with (fairly strong) UK input.

    The EU will require the UK to pay whatever is due and argue robustly about what is due (of course that discussion does not start with a blank sheet of paper, there is abundant evidence of certain obligations and well documented doubt about other items. You fellow brexiteer Davis supervised the first leg of EU-UK exit negotiations where the basis for calculation was an important topic).

    We will once again, sit back and watch the final stages of the game develop. We are in overtime now. Sudden death?

    1. Jiminyjim
      March 30, 2019

      ‘The EU wants the UK to remain”. But the EU will “REQUIRE” the UK to pay whatever is required. Oh dear, Rien, I’m afraid that you’ve summed up everything there.

      1. Rien Huizer
        March 30, 2019

        @ Jiminyjim

        Thank you for pointing this out to me. I left out “not”. The EU does not want the UK to stay in the Union and I hope the UK public will see that, finally. Once again, the money is insignificant for the EU and even for the UK’s economy (now around 1/7 of the overall Economy) it is not a whole lot, given that it is srpread over several years. Having a member like the UK is just too hard.

        1. Edward2
          March 31, 2019

          The third biggest contributor to the EU over decades.
          One of the world’s biggest economies.
          An economy bigger than 19 of the 28 added together.

  43. Dominic
    March 30, 2019

    What will the mendacious, nefarious May do next? Something completely radical? Something utterly left-field that takes us all by surprise?

    What we are seeing here is nothing less than a fight for our nation and a fight for the future leadership of the Tory party. We want our country back from the autocracy of the EU. Moreover, want our party pulled back from its obsession with trying to mirror Marxist Labour’s march leftwards

    The people of the UK are instinctively conservative.

    1. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      The consequence no party wants to consider, and one that I keep trying to warn about, is if the people get so fed up with being denied our democratic right, they take their grievance to the streets. This nation is now so bitterly divided, elements within it are preparing to do precisely that. So JR, please don’t shoot the messenger, for he just brings the timely message!

      May’s treachery will have further consequences if these people have their way.

    2. margaret howard
      March 30, 2019

      Dominic

      “We want our country back from the autocracy of the EU.”

      What exactly is it that we had before joining the EU that we don’t have now but you hope to have back?

      1. Edward2
        March 30, 2019

        Control over our laws, borders, taxation, and supremacy of our own courts.

  44. Jake Bennett
    March 30, 2019

    Westminster is rotten to its very core with only a few very honorable exceptions including Mr Redwood.

    1. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      Couldn’t agree more Jake, which is why we need to keep reminding both them, and the public. That way, we stand a chance of getting rid of the gravy-train lappers and have ourselves some honest politicians.

      Tad

  45. The Prangwizard
    March 30, 2019

    I must add my thanks to you Sir John for your relentless strength in resisting the pressures and threats you must have to endure daily and for ccontinuing to put the case for the UK’s freedom so clearly.

    I am so angry today I can barely get my thoughts together. I am disgusted beyond measure at the behaviour of May who clearly sees herself as agent of the EU and is supported by many subversive forces in our administration. We need to deal with these matters as if we were in a shooting war as they are fighting to destroy our democracy just as surely as if they had brought in foreign forces.

    1. Chris
      March 30, 2019

      Indeed, Prangwizard. I still think that many (and that includes some politicians) realise that this is the fight of our lives and we are up against Goliath.

      1. Chris
        March 30, 2019

        In my comment above responding to Prangwizard I omitted a “do not” so it should have read “I still think that many….do not realise that this is the fight of oour lives and we are up against Goliath.

  46. Bryan Harris
    March 30, 2019

    With more MP’s being ‘persuaded’ to vote for the surrender agreement, it seems that it is only DUP that have the integrity, (Hope that continues) to hold back the tide for ERG members.

    The only thing that must be done now is to stop May applying for a long extension – Would Brexiteers win a vote on that I wonder?

  47. bigneil
    March 30, 2019

    As the farce rolls on, is there any wonder why Joe Average doesn’t listen? Brian Rix would be too ashamed to be in this one.

  48. Anthony
    March 30, 2019

    But if we get a long delay will you please vote for the deal so we can leave? Please? If it turns out that the judgment that we would exhaust the patience of the EU is incorrect and they allow us to delay on only the condition that we hold EU elections, will you vote for the deal? It’s not a great deal, but it achieves most of control of laws, money in the long term and immigration. If this thing is delayed into 2020 it will be 4 years since the referendum. We hold elections after four years. The moral case for not holding another one becomes weaker. We are at risk of losing the whole thing – and that is a choice you’re making.

    Please, get us out. It will be possible to fix the rest later. It will take time but with determined men and women like you we’ll get there. But get us out now.

    1. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      This is yet another strategic psychological ploy by a very slippery government. This has all been worked out in advance. There surely cannot be anyone left who still believes in the integrity of May and Co. and that they are worth keeping. Yet for all the words of condemnation, their other strategy is to simply blank their critics and carry on regardless in the mistaken belief they can get away with it.

      The great empire’s reach is total and it’s just a mater of time – or so they think. They prevaricate and disregard the referendum and treat its outcome with thinly-veiled contempt, but I seem to recall another figure from history made a similar costly error with the British and their resolve. This might end up the same way.

  49. MPC
    March 30, 2019

    ‘You personally played a vital role in achieving something truly amazing. It would not have been possible without you. Britain can now look forward to the future as an outward-looking, optimistic and free nation, engaged fully with the world. You should take immense pride in the fact that the vote to Leave and take back control was in no small part due to you’

    Extract from a letter I received from Vote Leave following the referendum campaign. I don’t know whether to be mere annoyed with myself for being so naive in thinking I could make a difference, or with the signatories of the letter: Matthew Elliott, Michael Gove, Boris Johnson and Gisela Stuart.

  50. agricola
    March 30, 2019

    I have quite honestly lost track of where the executive power lies in the UK. Is it still with the PM and Cabinet or has it all been handed to Parliament. If it is the PM can she decide that we leave with no deal in the light of Parliaments inability to decide anything. Some definitive guidance would be helpful.

    1. miami.mode
      March 30, 2019

      agricola, emulating their beloved with its 5 presidents, we now seem to have something like 5 prime ministers.

  51. SueW
    March 30, 2019

    I believe there are a number of factors behind a reduced number of Leavers in comparison to Remainers joining protests in the capital. Some of us, myself included, would not wish to ever set foot in London, whatever the provocation. There are 8 million people there already, many not entitled to opine in a UK referendum but non the less very easily able to join a local protest. More difficult for someone from Newcastle or Barrow in Furness. It was held on a working day which would preclude attendance from the hardworking backbone of Britain. Add to that the fact that, if you have won, the impetus to protest is reduced. Once we have truly been robbed of our victory, you will see the worm turn without a doubt.

  52. Andrew S
    March 30, 2019

    March 29 Independence Day to remind us always of the treachery of the betrayor tory party.
    I was on the Leave march into Parliament Square yesterday, delightful, intelligent, reasoned educated ordinary folk, conservative minded a great many of them, all votable age, there voluntarily (not children brought along on a weekend by remainer mummies and daddies). All ages, all our great ethnic origins represented, banners from all over England and Wales.
    Great news about Grieve no-confidence, hopefully deselection follows. Grieve was in the 12th safest tory seat, in a 51% remain area. So bring on the deselections, if he can be got rid of so many others to follow. There are 62 remainer tories with under 10,000 majority, many of whom wafer thin (Crabbe Rudd Whittake, Bebb…) The next GE will easily see swathes of them out. Effectively the tories will change places with labour on seats and be wiped out locally, for a generation. Brexit Party MEPs aplenty to wreck the EU. That is the remainer May legacy. Loving it.

  53. ferdinand
    March 30, 2019

    It will be interesting to see if the letter to the EU agreeing the Article 50 extension is valid. The lawyers seem to think it isn’t. – So we have left ?

    1. Nicholas Murphy
      March 30, 2019

      It would be nice to think that this government even managed to screw that up!

    2. Mick
      March 30, 2019

      Don’t get my hopes built up , but wouldn’t it be nice and a right kick up the backside of all the remoaners

  54. John S
    March 30, 2019

    A voice of sanity in Parliament. I am most surprised and dismayed that Leavers such as Boris Johnson, Dominic Raab, David Davis, Esther McVey and James Cleverley voted for May’s horrific deal.

    1. Tad Davison
      March 30, 2019

      There are people who say they are Brexiteers, and there are true Brexiteers.

      Let’s go for total severance first, and then negotiate. Leavers may then be judged accordingly upon the amount of disruption they cause along the way.

      Tas

    2. L Jones
      March 30, 2019

      You’re right, John S. Those of this bunch who wish to be in with a chance at the job of PM should be viewed with suspicion. They turned coat and voted for her Treaty, despite warning us about how it was a sell-out to the EU. Who’s to say that, should any one of them succeed in becoming PM, they wouldn’t try to resurrect it since they’ve decided now that it’s acceptable?

      Doesn’t it smack of ”four legs good, two legs BETTER!”?

  55. Denis Cooper
    March 30, 2019

    https://www.politico.eu/article/michel-barnier-eu-open-to-customs-union-with-uk-brexit-deal/

    “Michel Barnier: EU open to customs union with UK”

    Of course the EU is open to the idea of luring the UK into the Turkey trap.

  56. Jacey
    March 30, 2019

    Many,many thanks for voting against this truly dreadful Withdrawal Agreement. I thought your speech in the debate was outstanding when in a few minutes you utterly demolished the validity of the Withdrawal Agreement.

  57. JOHN FINN
    March 30, 2019

    The UK now has just 12 days to decide if it wants to ask for a delay to leaving or else we will just leave.

    I think they’ve probably already decided.

    The EU would offer a delay in return for a second referendum or possibly a General election. There is no way Conservative MPs would support either of these ideas,

    Are you quite sure about that? It would only take half a dozen or so.

  58. nhsgp
    March 30, 2019

    https://ec.europa.eu/commission/sites/beta-political/files/draft_withdrawal_agreement_0.pdf
    This is the withdrawal agreement.

    Why is there no mention of any sums of money that will be paid? No 39 bn at all.

    The reason is that its close to 250 bn plus 43.5 bn a year, with no right to cancel.

    A vote for May’s deal is a vote for Austerity here.

  59. Edwardm
    March 30, 2019

    Thank you for staying true and voting down Mrs May’s surrender document.
    It is incomprehensible that the majority of Conservative MPs voted for it.

    Mrs May and her government should untwist themselves and decide to leave on WTO terms – so clean and simple and would end all this farce.

    1. L Jones
      March 30, 2019

      ”Incomprehensible” – unless, of course, they haven’t actually read it themselves, but just relied on their civil serpents to tell them all the important bits.

  60. William Long
    March 30, 2019

    My thanks to you and all otheres who voted against the WA yesterday; it looks as if you may have more opportunities to do so! I hear the Chairman of the Conservative Party says that grieve will not be de-selected despite the vote against him in his constituency. Is it for him to say?

  61. ukretired123
    March 30, 2019

    I see the Pro-EU media are calling the Pro-UK MPs who voted against the WA Spartans….!
    “Do your worst and we will do our best” to quote Churchill.

    I think many like Sir John voted for the Country First and not to protect their Conservative credentials for future leadership. Well done Sir John befitting your well earned knighthood standing up for the 17.4 million.

  62. 'None of the above'.
    March 30, 2019

    Your Party must, at all costs, stop TM requesting an extension to Art.50.
    She has consistently undermined my capacity to trust her and so I believe that something must be done now. If I add my concerns over the lack of loyalty to election manifestos and the result of the referendum, it seems to me that the HoC could do with a good clear out.
    I can only hope that many other MPs Constituency Parties will be just as resolute as Beaconsfield.

  63. Shieldsman
    March 30, 2019

    Boris Johnson was busy polishing the ‘turd’ yesterday, not that it did him any good in the eyes of the Conservative grassroots member. No excuses he is a waffler like Gove, they make a pair.
    The Sun quote him: – “Anyone defending the proposal we have just agreed will find it like trying to polish a turd,”
    Theresa May is talking about MV4, how stupid can she get. What do the Public think about her antics? She is bringing our Parliament and Democracy into disrepute.

  64. L Jones
    March 30, 2019

    ”… the ultimate act of betrayal…” Perhaps we shall have to start using the word ”penultimate” because it seems we never know how low these people will sink in their attempts to thwart our escape from this TRADE organisation.

    (Did we ever make it so difficult for our own empire’s countries to escape if they wished to?)

  65. Gareth Warren
    March 30, 2019

    The threat of holding a general election would be suicide to many conservative MPs and surely elect Corbyn as PM, so Theresa May is bluffing.

    The hard deadline from the EU sounds too like a bluff since the emergency summit has now been called, Macron and the rest will agree to a long extension.

    Corbyn I suspect is complicit with May, both have been dealing with the EU. So we have a standoff, one Corbyn profits from. It is not stable though, one remainer has already had the rug pulled out from him.

    I suspect if we do get a no deal brexit then another deal will quickly be offered, it will be marginally better – just the EU begging for money, but whatever happens the conservatives have to get brexit before the next election or else we have a landslide Corbyn government.

  66. Helen Smith
    March 30, 2019

    Your line, ‘it’s difficult to see EVEN MRS MAY changing her mind’ says it all, she has reneged on every promise, from not calling a GE, to standing down if she was no longer wanted, to not being in a CU or the SM or under the jurisdiction of the ECJ, to no deal is better than a bad deal, to we will leave on March 29th and of course to Brexit means Brexit.

    The woman is a serial liar, a blackmailer and a threat to the very existence of the Tory party.
    And the country. I fear she is actually deranged now, please do something.

    1. Chris
      March 30, 2019

      One hugely serious side effect of May’s open lying (quite apart from all the Brexit disaster) is that she is setting the example for how to behave. The electorate sees a key person in the country, who is supposed to be representing them and the country, proceeding to lie left right and centre, to undermine and operate covertly, to manipulate constitutional procedures to her advantage and much more. Does that now give them the OK to behave without honesty and dignity and to adopt the attitude that the end justifies the means?

      This could further speed up a breakdown in society, particularly as the state seems intent on taking more and more powers away from the family and individual and trying to impose their behavioural norms on society.

  67. Raymond
    March 30, 2019

    I am confused with the fuss. The referendum vote was for the UK to leave the EU. Either this happens or the referendum was a fraud.

  68. Freeborn John
    March 30, 2019

    Thank you for your vote yesterday against the Withdrawal Agreement. There was a big cheer during the march yesterday when the news spread through the marchers as we approached Palrliament Square.

  69. Sue Doughty
    March 30, 2019

    Theresa seems to have taken the instruction to leave the EU as a good reason to get into Number 10 to prevent it happening.
    Maybe she will vacate the top job and let someone willing to get us out of the EU take over if we promise to let her keep the car?

  70. Charles Crane
    March 30, 2019

    Whilst still a member of the Conservative Party, I admit to having just sent £25 to Mr Farage this morning and have now joined the Brexit Party.

    Given the mess that May has dropped us into – and the attitude of our local MP Jo Churchill who seems to think that the leave voting majority in this constituency can be safely ignored – I am even considering putting myself forward as a candidate for them. Having been ejected from her constituency AGM, I relish the opportunity to face her in an election debate. I have so far managed to talk her to a standstill on no less than four occasions.

    There is no way May will call and election as she knows her party will be annihilated but I would not put it past her to ask for a further extension even against the wishes of the House and the Country.

    We have had enough. Time to just walk away. The time of reckoning is coming for those who ignore the democratic instruction of the electorate.

  71. George Stewart
    March 30, 2019

    Dr. Redwood,

    With all due respect the ballot paper that won had one command, Leave the European Union.

    1. With existing Parliament arithmetic not what others may desire, what is your plan to fulfill the command of the referendum that will work with what you have?

    2. If there is a new referendum the question based on the Parliament we have will be Remain or Withdrawal agreement. In that case will you campaign for the Withdrawal agreement or campaign to Remain?

    Respectfully
    George Stewart

  72. Nicholas Murphy
    March 30, 2019

    ‘The government told Remain supporters voting down the Agreement would lead straight to a No deal exit, and told Leavers it would lead to a long delay in Brexit.’ Too many people who think of politics as a game are in high places. We need a cull of Spads and the ‘communications’ staff.
    Today’s job is to request my postal vote – for no other reason than I can then spoil it at the local elections on May 2nd.

  73. The mad govt
    March 30, 2019

    John, if they bring it back a fourth time get all ministers voting it down to go to come undiscloded location until its time to vote, as they are probably going to start pulling your finger nails out soon. Keep strong!

  74. villaking
    March 30, 2019

    Sir John,
    Having seen the surprise capitulation of some your colleagues yesterday (Mr Rees-Mogg and others), do you not think Mrs May’s likely strategy of one last push is now the most likely end to this debate? I’m not sure how many of your group of principled leavers will stay firm once the DUP capitulates, maybe you have an idea? The DUP, 10 more Labour and 10 of the Conservative objectors and Mrs May is home.

  75. Ginty
    March 30, 2019

    Off topic but indicative of this country’s inability to do ANYTHING.

    The latest London knife murder. Met Police Chief Cressida Dick says “It’s the most worrying knife crime level in 40 years.”

    So we were all stabby stabby in 1979 ???

    I don’t recall that. Does anyone else ???

    Are they trying to deceive us that this situation was ever thus ?

  76. Bob
    March 30, 2019

    I hear that govt moved six water cannons towards London yesterday, the day of the pro Brexit protest.

    Why didn’t they do that on the day of the anti Brexit protest?

  77. Tony Keogan
    March 30, 2019

    A General Election .. who on Earth would you TRUST with your vote this time around … ? Following events I wrote to the electoral commission .. below:

    I am wrote to all three Political bodies to insist that they take my address; Little Dubious on the Wold off their lists for both the mailing of propaganda and “door stepping”

    I did this not just because of the extreme embarrassment I feel over the implementation of the Referendum result and their collective Political scheming in trying to overturn Democracy itself, but because I now understand that the lack of integrity and honesty on show should be expected, as spelt out by the Electoral Commission following my enquiry of them about Electoral fraud.

    Electoral Fraud; Given the number of the “Right Honourable” fighting the referendum result and by so doing the Electorate at large, is there not a case of Electoral Fraud here, where all members of the Main parties promised to honour the result in their recent Election Manifestos? Surely their electorate should be given a chance to re-cast their vote; “Now they understand what their representatives actually stand for” in a series of Bye-Elections?
    Regards Tony K

    They Replied: Thank you for your email lo to the Electoral Commission.

    Election campaign material must include information to identify the person or organisation which has caused it to be published, and must not include false statement of fact about the personal character or conduct of a candidate. This is in addition to the wider laws on defamation and incitement, which apply to election campaign material in the same ways as any other published communications. However, Parliament has not legislated to require that the content of election material must be truthful or factually substantiated. The law gives a high degree of protection to freedom of expression, which is of paramount importance during electoral campaigns and only restricted under limited circumstances.

    We are being Ruled not Governed and until we remove Parliamentary Privilege, where there are consequences for such actions as we are witnessing today then all trust is lost.

    Regards

    Tony Keogan

  78. Jane
    March 30, 2019

    Thank you for being principled yesterday. It was a difficult decision for others.
    It is not democratic surely for the PM to bring this back for another go.

    It is time the EU considers whether they really want to trap us in a Hotel Calfornia situation.
    They will not budge if we keep doing the running.
    .

  79. 'None of the above'.
    March 30, 2019

    By the way, there is a petition on the Parliament Petition web site asking to support leaving the EU without an agreement on 12th April. My Wife and I have signed and others are adding their signatures at the rate of around 3800 per hour currently.

  80. javelin
    March 30, 2019

    Grieve and Schiff, both chairmen of the intelligence committee in the UK and US, both have their careers censured this week, for thecsane reason of misleading voters. One on their election mandate the other on evidence on Russia.

    God is draining the swamp and it appears the momentum has its own speed as long as we supply the direction and energy. It appears God is on our side.

  81. Tony Sharp
    March 30, 2019

    Sir John,
    The problem for the tory Party is Theresa May and her Payroll supporters – these do not represent the views of either the Associations (hats off the Beaconsfield CA) or the generality of traditional Conservative voters. She will destroy your Party unless you split from it and challenge these people in any subsequent Election – however, I doubt the Payroll MPs will support her if you at least Abstain on a Commons No Confidence Vote – would they want to fight a General Election for this Serial Loser?

  82. Kevin Lohse
    March 30, 2019

    I have a strong suspicion that the EU will refuse any further time and tell the UK it’s WTO Brexit or Remain. The Remain majority in Parliament will vote for the withdrawal of Art 50. Job done,the electorate sold down the river. The Brexiteer minority better get themselves organised as a party, because after the next GE there won’t be a Conservative Party for them to be part of.

  83. Jane
    March 30, 2019

    Also I think the EU will push us to revoke Art. 50, because they will not want us to leave on WTO terms and neither will the Remain MPs.

    Mission accomplished for EU!

  84. formula57
    March 30, 2019

    Were Parliament on the fourth attempt to pass the “Stay in and pay up” Treaty of surrender devised by T. May, should there not then follow a fifth vote to allow Parliament to reverse its decision – and as many subsequent votes as are needed to achieve reversal?

  85. outsider
    March 30, 2019

    Dear Sir John, It is now very hard to be optimistic. It seems that the only possibility of a genuine Brexit is if the Prime Minister asks the European Council for a longer extension on April 10 and one or more of the 27 vetoes it. Perhaps over the Parliamentary elections issue.

    A coup has been set in motion. If the HoC agrees the “Customs Union” option on Monday; the PM brings back her Withdrawal Agreement in an amended or amendable form so that Labour can support a composite WA + request for permanent Customs Union. M Barnier is reported to have indicated that the “immutable” WA could then be be amended to accept this request within the the 48 hours before April 12.

  86. BR
    March 30, 2019

    While remain would be a better option than the WA, isn’t the real danger that the WA passes with a CU tacked onto it? It’s difficult to see how the voting would go without so many abstentions, but that would be a worse outcome than just voting through the WA as it stands and exiting the backstop later.

    I’m not saying that you’re wrong to hold out, only that you need to be confident that the CU bolt-on isn’t going to happen.

  87. glen cullen
    March 30, 2019

    While I totally agree with your sentiment and context we should also consider who has ownership of the leave process and who stole the process

    The people owned the referendum
    The leave voters owned the result
    The leave voters owned the implementation and gave an instruction (now stolen by MPs)

    Ask any leave voter; they expected only one type of leave (WTO first Deal later) ask any remainer voter; they say there are many different types of leave (to advance a remain option)

    The implementation of the result was stolen by elite remain politicians (by elite I mean they believe they know what is best)

    The failure to leave on the 29th March will have grave consequences for democracy and our political/ parliamentary system

    If Tory win at general election they don’t implement Labour policies, and Labour don’t implement Tory policies. Leave won so they shouldn’t be implementing remain policies

    Faith and confidence in the political / MPs role in the referendum process needs to be restored. This can only be achieved by MPs realising that they can’t change the result, dates, nor options. Unlike a general election, it’s not there decision.

  88. Russ
    March 30, 2019

    The crazy MPs are making their bid for eternal communist dictatorship. I am not holding out we will ever see another GE election again?

  89. Steve Reay
    March 30, 2019

    When we voted to leave ,leaving with a deal wasn’t on the leaflet that the gov sent out , therefore just leave.

  90. agricola
    March 30, 2019

    If Parliament rejects the ” stay in and pay up” route to enlightenment the logic suggests they accept, 23do a runner ie get out and do not pay. However logic has been a rare commodity in this Parliament. Is this due to accomtmodating a glut of lawyers and a dirth of mathmaticians, scientists and engineers. Summing it up, Parliament is one big self indulgence at the expense of the UK and all in it.

  91. Alastair McIntyre
    March 30, 2019

    I believe that the BBC has done an excellent job on being against Brexit and I actually blame all MP’s for not raising this issue in all the various interviews they give to the BBC. Why won’t they just mention in their interviews the fact that the BBC are anti-Bexit? A constant drip on the BBC’s anti-Brexit stance would do much to mitigate against their prejudice.

    1. rose
      March 30, 2019

      Even on the 29 March 2019 the BBC had one Brexiteer – a polite and gentle one – up against 4 remainers on Any Questions. It is very hard for the sole Brexiteer to get a word in, let alone correct all of the lies and propaganda coming from the others.

      But we got an unexpected windfall yesterday in that John Humphrys was interviewing Mervyn King and let him speak in a civilized and uninterrupted way. If it had been Mishal Hussein or Martha Kearney they would have gone down their prompt sheet of hostile questions and shouted down all the answers.

      1. Lifelogic
        March 31, 2019

        Indeed the BBC is appalling biased on Brexit indeed wrong on almost every issue.

    2. Caterpillar
      March 30, 2019

      Alasdair McIntyre,

      Not only have the BBC and other media sources taken up the anti-Brexit stance, and this after the referendum, but they and the opposition have failed to hold the Government to account. Once A50 was triggered there should have been two possible paths, the negotiated path and the no deal path. During the past 2 years the Govt has failed to fully prepare for the no deal path and has continually sent signals to businesses that this would not occur. This would seem to border on negligence by Govt and Civil Service, but moreover the media and opposition have similarly failed. With an incessant focus on the already lost remain argument they have given Govt cover to hide behind. Even now they continue to give May somewhere to hide so that she can claim her WA honours the referendum. It doesn’t. The BBC, other media and opposition need to get on the no deal path and press the Govt about its preparation.

    3. Tad Davison
      March 31, 2019

      You won’t get an argument from me. If the BBC can’t be made more even-handed, it ought to be broken up. Having to pay for the evil empire’s mouthpiece to spout yet more twisted propaganda is anathema to all thinking people who believe in democracy.

      Tad

  92. Denis Cooper
    March 30, 2019

    JR, so is it of no interest at all at this critical juncture that in July 2017 the Shadow Trade Secretary Barry Gardiner wrote an article entitled:

    “Brexit means leaving the single market and the customs union. Here’s why”

    which is still freely available on the Guardian website and can easily be found just by putting the title into an internet search engine such as google?

    1. Tad Davison
      March 31, 2019

      Thanks Denis,

      That has given me yet more ammunition. I missed it first time around as I won’t usually touch the Guardian with a barge pole.

      Tad

  93. Denis Cooper
    March 30, 2019

    The Irish Times has an interesting and in some ways revealing article, which can easily be found by putting its title:

    “Government faces tense week over Brexit border plans”

    into an internet search engine.

    I say that it is revealing in particular because it states without question that:

    “Avoiding checks would require some type of backstop-style arrangement where the rules are the same in the North as in the Republic and the EU accepts that goods are checked to a sufficient standard entering the island of Ireland.”

    which fails to recognise that the only goods which are relevant to this question are those which actually cross the border into the Republic and so it is only necessary for EU rules to be applied to those goods, not to all the goods in circulation in the North.

    This is a blind spot for EU Single Market ideologues, including our Prime Minister, and even when it is explained to the Irish:

    http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2018/09/21/the-eu-is-more-preoccupied-with-migration-than-with-brexit/#comment-962198

    it does not seem to sink in.

    1. acorn
      March 31, 2019

      Read RTE article: “Brexit: Home truths – no deal and the Irish border”.

      1. Tad Davison
        March 31, 2019

        See what the former Irish ambassador to Canada, Dr. Ray Bassett says about Irexit and the back stop (on YouTube – The Government is Misleading us on the Border with Northern Ireland). If any remainer needs confirmation that the EU is corrupt, they should listen to this man.

        Tad

      2. Denis Cooper
        March 31, 2019

        Why?

        Because it repeats fables such as “We will have stop trucks at the border and collect customs duties from the drivers.” and “Unless the UK is kept under the same EU rules it will flood our precious Single Market with US-style poisonous chlorinated chicken.”?

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