The deliberate log jam created by the last Parliament was preventing good government, undermining us abroad and seeking to subvert the results of the EU referendum. We had to ask the voters to make a decision.
They have done so in a clear way. There was a big choice to make. Did they want a Corbyn led government with massive promises to increase spending, borrowing and taxes, or did they want a moderate reflation of the economy with some spending increases for important services and some tax cuts? Did they trust Labour or the Conservatives with the security and future of our country. They gave aĀ convincing answer last night.
There was also the question of how many voters did wish to go back on the referendum to leave the EU. Prime Minister in waiting Jo Swinson offered the country the choice to revoke our application to leave by a simple repeal vote in Parliament. It was a bold and radical proposal. Just 11% backed it, and her own voters instead asked her to leave Parliament. I hope those who keep telling us people want to remain will reflect on this result.
Labour says they lost because the failed to back Brexit, having done so in 2017 when they got a better result. Doubtless there was some of that in the poor results they achieved, but there was also the prior questions about economic management and direction and style of leadership which dominated in many discussions.
Now this new Conservative majority government has two immediate tasks. It does need as the PM says to “get Brexit done”, which means taking back control of our money, borders and laws, and means negotiating that Free Trade Agreement the EU has promised in principle. It also means an early budget, as we are in urgent need of a stimulus, at a time of world slowdown and worldwide manufacturing recession.
December 13, 2019
Steve Gooncan and Huge Grunt won it for you.
They insulted Brexit voters as we were about to leave for polling. I voted Tory simply because I could not allow them their win.
Please do not let us down. And PLEASE sort out the BBC. Its entertainment is unwatcheable because of political correctness and it is politically biased. Scrap the licence.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations on being returned to Parliament. Long may you be there.
December 13, 2019
The country and Tory party owe a debt of gratitude to Nigel Farage. He personally gave so much, ridiculed, smeared, hounded, threat of violence, assaulted. All for his country to be independent. Coward Cameron now begrudgingly giving forced platitudes after he ran off!
Well done JR. You will be required to act very quickly and very robustly against Johnson’s servitude plan. Give the backbone to new entrants to force a leave worth having. WTO by 31/01/2010.
December 14, 2019
I agree fully on Farage. Let us hope Boris can be encourage to take the right road to far smaller government, a real Brexit and climate and energy realism.
Let us hope Kwasi Kwarteng will be allowed to have a sensible energy policy. He is a sensible chap even if he as usual for energy ministers has zero science. Peter Lilly would be better. Kwasi would be better than (Islamophobia enquiry pusher) lefty Javid I suspect as chancellor.
December 13, 2019
Indeed the amusing Quentin Letts book, āPatronising Bastardsā has it right.
December 13, 2019
Yes sort out the BBC licence. Get rid of it.
Demand a bye election if changing party after winning a seat
No Scottish Referendum. We have already had a once in a lifetime vote.
Go to the EU and tell them what we want instead of being dictated to.
December 13, 2019
Let the Scots have it but let the English have a vote on it too. They’ll be out in no time.
December 13, 2019
BW
“No Scottish Referendum. We have already had a once in a lifetime vote.”
That was BEFORE the Brexit referendum. That disastrous vote changed everything.
December 13, 2019
Still no majority in Scotland to be independent.
December 13, 2019
Edward2,
Presumably there is a percentage that want to leave the UK and leave EU, presumably there is a percentage that want to leave UK but don’t support Ms Sturgeon/SNP. I suspect that taking about 45% of vote given other factors probably indicates there is a majority to leave. I would think a quick referendum with no need for a campaign – Scotland have been through all this quite recently – would sort it out one way or another. I think the sooner the better.
I see no need for rUK to campaign for Scotland to remain in UK. It was unpleasant seeing Guy Verhofstadt in UK during EU elections, I think rUK should leave Scotland to arrange, fund and hold a referendum asap.
December 14, 2019
Yes, Margaret, and the Stay result hinged on a so-called pledge by Cameron’s Tories, which was torn up before the last votes were even counted.
That should, by any reasonable standard, at the very least have allowed each nation of the UK a veto on exit from the European Union, as is standard in normally-constituted associations of countries.
It did not, and so I think that the Scots deserve another vote.
December 13, 2019
Yes, the fallacy that My Enemy’s Enemy Is My Friend did exactly that, and allowed the Tories to mop up the BNP-EDL-BF vote in areas where those would otherwise have been strong, under whatever name they go now.
Actually, Labour’s vote was generally at the 2001 level, when they got a majority.
I wonder what will happen when sensible arrangements with the European Union are agreed, as now seem likely without having to appease the ERG and the DUP?
December 13, 2019
You still don’t get it martin.
Blaming everyone else.
Corbyn and Marxism was rejected.
December 13, 2019
Martin in Cardiff
Go and research cognitive dissonance
Unless you genuinely believe that former working class voters of Blythe Valley etc were all
1) Right wing fascists
2) Billionaires
Labour has had a very strong message
The ordinary people of UK believe in democracy and implementing its results
The ordinary people of UK abhor antisemitism and racism
The ordinary people of the UK totally reject Marxist Socialism
Working people do NOT like the ultra woke identity politics of the extreme left
Labour is finished as a party
December 13, 2019
The anti-semitic vote went to Labour & not aware that the BNP/EDL were even standing.
The political reality has changed with the people’s election.
Time you considered some quiet reflection?
December 13, 2019
Watching Sky at the moment and they are touring former Labour strongholds in the North East & Midlands. What is very clear is that whilst Brexit was an issue, life-long Labour voters refused to vote for Corbyn. A man in West Bromwich has just said he remembers his Dad only being able to work 3-days a week and the lights going out.
Thank goodness for that but what a pity many young Labour supporters don’t remember the 70’s because it would open their eyes to the likes of Corbyn & McDonald.
Fortunately, this morning we can breathe a sigh of relief – as the common sense of folk in the North have pulled us back from the Marxist abyss…
December 13, 2019
Don’t understand your comment on the Labour vote in 2001? It was 40.7% of votes cast, way above what they got yesterday.
December 14, 2019
Sorry, 2005
December 13, 2019
MiC
Pathetically try to play it down as much as you like fact is you lost… again.
December 14, 2019
The party for which I voted lost, Steve, but, in life generally, I did not.
I’ve been very fortunate like that, like most Remain voters.
I’m sorry if you haven’t.
December 13, 2019
This could very well be the start of the big betrayal. Boris has a mandate to get us out of the EU but I fear it will be a semi detached leaving with Boris aligning us up to all the EU institutions.
When he presents the awful WA to Parliament and tries to ram it through with all the bear traps and pitfalls, we will know his intentions.
The Spartans have been neutralised so he has a more or less free hand.
No need for the WA or transition to nowhere period.
Out means Out
December 13, 2019
The Spartans have indeed neutralised themselves. Our kind host, was the last man standing. Whether he does still stand I dont, know, though either way it’s academic. A one-man rebellion will change nothing. I woukd humbly suggest that semi-detached is over-optimistic. I think we’ll be in the granny annexe š
December 13, 2019
Agreed.
December 13, 2019
Sorry, congratulations on being re appointed
December 13, 2019
Yup.
December 13, 2019
The alternative would have been no Brexit at all – so what would you prefer? I’m sure his agreement isn’t perfect but it’s most certainly better than not leaving. Why not give Boris the benefit of the doubt and see what happens now his hands aren’t tied behind his back.
December 13, 2019
Yes, we should give him the benefit of the doubt – but it does no harm that he should know we are watching.
December 13, 2019
And Mr J (et al) should be reminded of their pledge (standup4brexit.com) to ”abandon” T May’s WA as ”dead”.
December 13, 2019
“Entertainment”? – -couldn’t you find a more realistic description? Entertainment it ain’t. It appears that any new presenter has to be either gay or non-white – – – or both.
December 13, 2019
I don’t mind so long as they speak clear, grown-up English.
The word Life is becoming Laaf and the word Like is becoming Laaak, the word Skills is becoming Skiwels.. I could go on. All sound very baby-ish and the true reason why some find it difficult getting jobs.
December 14, 2019
@Anonymous “Please do not let us down. And PLEASE sort out the BBC.”
Indeed, and especially the BBC WS (its purpose, reason for being), for far to long now the WS has appeared to be the true face of the often suggested ‘Brussels Broadcasting Corporation’.
Might I suggest taking funding fully back to (a reformed) FCO, moving WS editorial production and presentation away from NBH (and/or MC in Salford), the editorial ethos within the WS was far, far, better when located in Bush House!
December 13, 2019
JR, glad you beat the turncoat traitor Lee. The other Tory traitors were beaten as well.
Sadly Yvette Cooper got back in by a whisper. It is shocking why so many like her supported a anti semite Marxist security threatening party who hated its own country.
Suggest you read Con Woman and you will see how bad Johnson’s servitude plan is on fishing.
You told us you wanted a small majority of thirty, unfortunately the ERG will not be able to change or influence Johnson’s servitude plan unless the ERG numbers increase.
Johnson claimed today it gave him a mandate for zero carbon by 2050 because that is what the voters voted for. I do not think that is true at all. His freeloading girlfriend might want it, but not the vast public at large.
etc ed
December 13, 2019
Good old lefty dope Cooper-Balls Oxford PPE yet again!
āJohnson claimed today it gave him a mandate for zero carbon by 2050ā you say clearly he has little grasp or understanding the laws of physics, energy engineering or economics. This would be impossible and a very damaging thing to even try to do. Can he appoint someone sensible with some grasp of science, numbers and energy reality (like Lord Lilley, Lord Ridley or even Corbynās brother Piers) to this vital area.
Certainly not English Graduate Gove please.
December 13, 2019
The increase in atmospheric CO2 concentrations are, on balance, doing far more good than harm in greening the planet (by increasing tree and plant growth, biodiversity and crop yields). This as many sensible realist scientists like Freeman Dyson point out. Anyway exporting high energy intensive jobs then importing (steel for example) does nothing for world C02 emissions probably make them worse. If you actually think C02 is bad that is in the St Greta āthe alarmist, end of the world in neighā mode?
December 14, 2019
Emissions and CO2 have never been in lockstep, annual CO2 increase does not correlate with annual temperature increases. CO2 is innocent! Of course, they talk about zero “carbon”, not CO2 .
In any case, UK emissions are just over 1% of global, China 28% and rising. If we emitted no CO2 starting tomorrow, no-one would notice, especially the climate.
December 13, 2019
Hope, the ERG now has a whole lot more support! And Boris knows it was Brexit wot won it! He also knows how ruthless the British voters are – they sack politicians and governments with monitors regularity! He dare not betray us – so cheer up! Itās a Great Day.
December 13, 2019
”.. He dare not betray us…” No, indeed. Unless he has the power of the EU behind him.
(PS And I say this, while wanting with every fibre that he’ll be the Man that came in the Hour.)
December 14, 2019
Perhaps your memory fails you. ERG and Johnson said May’s deal was dead. His deal is Mayhab’s servitude plan and now they are all supporting it!
First job leave clean break no WA or PD, change parliament act, climate Change Act, get rid of Supreme Court, quangos etc. This will Send out a clear loud message to remain metropolitan elite establishment. Disband and disperse them. Everyone knows get main business done in first two years. No time to dilly dally.
December 13, 2019
Here’s the thing, Lynn Atkinson.
The ERG may be pushed out but in order for the PM to reconcile his core Tory voters with ‘borrowed’ Labour voters (and the amount of leftism that is going to have to be paid back to them) he must deliver a proper Brexit.
That is what both have asked for.
There is a third grouping. Brexit voters like me who have also lent our vote to him.
I ask Sir John to remind him of this fact and also take this opportunity to thank John for moderating one of my posts in this thread and saving me from some embarrassment and unwinnable conflict as my comment was wrong.
December 13, 2019
Dear Sir John,
Congratulations! I’m delighted that you will be back in parliament and your pithy and first class speeches.
December 13, 2019
The voters would never let the democratic will of the people be stolen from us.Boris must make it happen for all.
December 13, 2019
Well they very nearly did from Ted Heath onwards with the endless loss of our democracy to the EU. The people were only ever given any say thanks to Farage forcing the hand of Cameron.
Even now I fear it is still in danger with this rancid not leaving W/A.
December 13, 2019
Yes, LL. I fear that this WA might leave the door ajar for the big feet of the EU.
Give them enough power over us (as with this current WA) and they will find a way of scuppering/nobbling/disallowing any future elections so that we’d be stuck with THEIR choice of what’s ”acceptable” for The Project.
December 13, 2019
John quotes percentages for parties as being for a particular policy on the European Union by the respective party.
OK, well taken together, the vote for pro-European Union parties was 54% as against 46% for pro-Leave ones.
If we had PR, then would John accept Parliament’s cancelling of exit as democratic, I wonder?
If not, then why not?
Reply Labour’s position was ambiguous so I do not accept your figures.
December 13, 2019
MiC
A word of friendly advice, in business ( as in life) the winners are people who get strong feedback and then alter their approach and customer offering The losers are people who when facing strong feedback , ignore it, find excuses and try to fool themselves that its the customers who dont understand
Its the same with politics. Labour only won elections in the last 50 years when they had a centrist social democratic approach , failure to recover some form of New Labour type approach will destroy the Labour Party. We need a healthy opposition
December 13, 2019
You lost again, get over it.
December 13, 2019
Here we go again.
There was a clear choice if you wanted Remain. The Lib Dems.
The Brexit Party was stood down in many constituencies. We sucked it up when we should have had 70 odd MPs in the previous general election.
If you don’t like the voting system please leave the country. Remain have lost yet again.
December 13, 2019
OK, pro-Remain or pro-second vote, then.
Most of your commenters say they are the same thing though.
If 54% of MPs were of that inclination, then would you say that a democratic mandate existed for whatever position on which they might agree?
December 13, 2019
MiC
No because our electoral system doesn’t work like that
Referendums work like that and Leave won
The Tories were the only party to offer Brexit, they won, again , and again and again
How many times are you going to lose before you finally wake up and realise people dont like marxism, people dont like the EU and people dont like the woke identity politics. Stop pandering to the kiddie vote and you might get somewhere
December 13, 2019
And the Brexit Party won the EU elections and the vast majority did not vote to support MEPs opposed to Art 50… in fact the vast majority didn’t vote for an MEP at all and it didn’t really make any difference anyway because the EU Parliament is a bogus parliament.
Furthermore 99% of Remainers haven’t a clue who their MEPs are ! I know because I always ask them when they tell me they voted Remain.
I sucked it up when none of my UKIP candidates were selected – we should have had 70 odd MPs.
Unlike Martin I abide by the rules and honour results.
I sincerely ask him to leave the country if he can’t put up with its system. The alternative to it is a succession of useless coalitions. He seems determined to keep us deadlocked until we break and he gets his way.
December 13, 2019
Oh dear dear dear, M in C.
The words ”straws” and ”clutching” spring to mind!
December 13, 2019
Congratulations on retaining your seat, Sir John and fending off the LibDems.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations John. This morning the first thing I did was to search out the Wokingham result and then greatly relived, I looked for my own constituency to make sure we had put an end to Grieve’s career. The future now seems brighter than it has for three years.
ps I love the “Prime Minister in waiting Jo Swinson” line.
December 13, 2019
Good morning Sir John
Once more congratulations.
My hope is we as a Country can move on from the last damaging deceitful Parliament that wasted 3 years fighting the People in a disgusting manner. In 3 years the last parliament did more damage to the UK economy than anyone could have imagined. It is not leaving the EU that damaged the UK it was a Parliament that didn’t want to run a Country that pulled the UK back.
To be an all inclusive nation it has to be recognized that we will thrive by be being as far as possible removed from any EU rule, rules and interpretations of their version of trade and partnership means. The EU is a protectionist club built to profit its rulers not the people.
December 13, 2019
Ian
” The EU is a protectionist club built to profit its rulers not the people.”
It didn’t lead us into an illegal war with Iraq and all the disasters that followed that particular shameful act. Our good friends the Americans did that.
December 13, 2019
mags
whataboutery is a facile argument . The illegal war was perpetrated by one of your EU heroes T Blair
The EU did hang Ukraine out to dry, it stood by why Catalonia was assaulted and it wasn’t overly helpful in Yugoslavia either ( a massive war in Europe hmm)
December 13, 2019
Still living in the past Margaret.
Blair and Bush are long gone.
December 14, 2019
OK, well don’t remind anyone about the so-called Winter Of Discontent or the IMF then, eh?
December 14, 2019
Continually making a point about the Iraq war and forgetting it was Blair and the Labour Party that decided to go to war in order to try to show how wonderful and peaceful the EU is, fails.
The EUs foreign policies have been poor.
Yugoslavia Ukraine Russia Ireland Catalonia.
Their current expansionist policies are a future danger to peace in Europe.
Your comparison concerns domestic economic policies which are not relevant in this context.
December 13, 2019
War mongering is one thing Donald Trump cannot be accused of. The most peaceful President to date.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations on re-securing your seat.
Now aim both barrels at your vicious enemies who’ve spent years targeting decent Tory and BP people
Start with that vile entity the BBC and then work your way through the viper’s nest of leftist controlled taxpayer financed public organisations
Please, persuade your government to dismantle Labour’s Quangocracy. They’re out of control and they need to be put back in the box
December 13, 2019
I watched Christine Lagarde on an American network yesterday delivering her first speech for the ECB.
She did not mention Brexit but said that sometime in the month of January 2020 , she and the ECB will be doing a “Strategic Review” lasting for a full year. She could not be detailed but would be consulting here there and everywhere.”The first one for sixteen years”.
I think she had an idea Boris would be successful. Perhaps she can move faster.We are now impatient.
December 13, 2019
LOL. How does that woman do it? She has training as a Lawyer but not as a Banker but is now running the ECB having left her top job in the IMF, where all she did, was to promote the EU.
I suppose its could be like having an EU plumber in charge of Urology in a major hospital.
December 14, 2019
She’s only a front,like Stoltenberg at NATO,for the forces that really control things-or thought they did until Russia and China spoilt things for them.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations John, you were the only candidate that ran a positive campaign, without trying to smear your opposition.
I thought the LibDem campaign was an absolute disgrace, and Dr Philip Lee has now got his just desserts, as has Jo Swinston.
I wonder how much they actually spent with the 17 different leaflets that were delivered through my letterbox.
Now let us hope that Boris will move with speed, to push the Conservatives forward to a sensible and clean Brexit, so that we do actually take back proper control of our own Country and at the same time get a grip on so many Government Departmental failures of the past.
December 13, 2019
Congrats on your hold. Great result for Boris.
Now, depoliticise the NHS by explicitly separating it from political control. Nationalise it – a state run privatisation.
Five years to solidify the destruction of all this left wing bleating about “public services”.
December 13, 2019
Well done indeed, for seeing through the dire Corbyn, magic money tree, fraudulent, fake promises and con tricks of would be thieves Corbyn/Mc Donnall and the rest. They were/are complete con merchant and the voters, especially the sensible northerners, saw right through it. A shame the Scots did not see through the snake oil saleswoman Sturgeon. What do they see in her and the dire Ian Blackford?
The Conservative won easily despite the huge, blatant and incessant bias of the BBC and Channel 4. Left wing, pro EU, anti-Boris and climate alarmist pushing drivel from them every single day.
Great to see the back of Grieve, Soubry, Gauke, Hammond and the rest of the traitors. Though some blatant traitors are still now Conservative MPs having been allowed to stand.
The dire, wrong headed, endlessly interrupting, lefty remainer dope English graduate Andrew Marr thinks Boris will now move to the centre and take on the hard Brexit wing. This would be a huge mistake if he does. The Conservative party is far too left wing already.
The unelected Andrew Adonis just now:- We just had the second referendum – but it was a second referendum on Corbyn, not on Brexit, which is why we lost itā
What a deluded man he is, but alas as a Lord we cannot get rid of him.
What is needed now is large tax cuts, far smaller government, cheap energy, culling on all the green crap agenda, a real & clean Brexit (not the May Treaty deal with fig leaves), a bonfire of red tape, competitive banking, relaxation of planning, a fiscal and monetary boost and some uplifting vision.
Start by undoing almost everything that the dire pro EU, green crap socialist Major, Clarke, Blair, Brown, Darling, Cameron, Osborne, Hammond and May did.
December 13, 2019
Marr might be a dope, but I’m confident that he is essentially right – though in terms of substance, BJ never moved from the centre. It was only some of his rhetoric that leads some to believe he’s lurching the country to the right.
December 14, 2019
I hope he is not right.
December 14, 2019
The rest of the Boris family are certainly pro EU, Libdims, climate alarmists & lefties!
December 13, 2019
Same old, same old. Thank goodness you didnāt write the manifesto. The Tories would have never been elected. As ever you are ādeafā to the politics.
The green agenda is here to stay as is the need to invest more in public services. Once Brexit gets done, we revert to domestic politics and the āold traditionalā labour constituencies, if they are not to switch back need a more inclusive One Nation approach than than the me me me of the traditional wealthy Tory right.
December 13, 2019
What did you think of Al’s speech, where near the top of his priorities was tackling climate change? Perhaps he will propose Ultra Low Emissions Zones for all of our great cities and not just London too?
I wonder if he will revive his amnesty for clandestine immigrants with his unfettered majority?
Varadkar thinks that he will agree to European Union rules and standards to ease a trade deal too. Oh, with Our European FRIENDS.
December 13, 2019
Mic
As you clearly dont have the faintest clue about trade why do you persist in making yourself look stupid by posting on the subject?
December 14, 2019
Answer my questions.
Where in my comment do I give any opinion about trade anyway?
What is the matter with you?
December 14, 2019
MiC
Do you not even read your own posts? Dont blame you they are drivel but heres what YOU said
“Varadkar thinks that he will agree to European Union rules and standards to ease a trade deal too. ” Right there were you said TRADE DEAL you mentioned TRADE
What is the matter with you?
December 13, 2019
The 21 traitors who were suspended were referred to as āmoderate Conservativesā by the BBC chap on radio 4 just now. What on earth is moderate about the total treachery of the Benn Act?
Why one earth were 10 allowed back in and four to stand is the real question. Alas Hillary Benn got re-elected. Would his father have voted for him? I suspect not.
December 13, 2019
Sadly the so called Conservative party are nothing of the sort. BluLabour is a more accurate description.
December 13, 2019
It appears that Boris’ promise to end the BBC Licence has swung the result in his favour.
Let’s hope he doesn’t backtrack on the issue!
December 13, 2019
Yesterday morning, I guessed at 192 Labour seats. I was angry when the projection was one out. Anyway, it turned out to be in reality 203,
Ok ok I was a few thousand votes out.
Pundits say they are surprised “the poorest in decades-long Labour constituencies, who need buses…voted Conservative!!!!!.”
Our media never understands patriotism. Never understands our land is all they have.
December 13, 2019
Iām in the north. Labour voters RAN to the polls to sack the Remainers. We needed only to stand aside and not divert them. The North has saved the metropolitan elitists again!
December 13, 2019
Oh…the relief!
We are not a communist country.
I will not need a Mao suit.
Thank you JR.
Thank you Tories for being so clever!!
We can have Christmas!!!
December 13, 2019
Oh yes..and thank you everyone else for a fantastic ārising upā!!
The Left shattered.
December 13, 2019
The left is in government. BJ is high tax, high spend, nanny knows best.
December 13, 2019
Iāve suffered under the left wing Tories for the last however many years. I hated the Blair years too.
As to Boris, I am fully aware of his drawbacks, but make no mistake, a commie Corbyn govt would have been more than most could stand.
I have a particular insight into the sort of people who trail behind him. Not nice!!
I also realise that ( with the help of sheep) we have been manoeuvred into having NO ALTERNATIVES.
December 13, 2019
Oh no we’re not!
December 13, 2019
You’re right. The Left is in government, but not left enough for you !
December 13, 2019
You hit on the keywords log-jam Sir John!
For over a decade a log-jam has materialised on roads, railways, in schools, hospitals and housing, in the real world outside Westminster bubble.
Nigel Farage mentioned it to Andrew Neil:
“Have you been in the M25 recently?”
Due to PC over this time few people could discuss it.
The log-jam eventually materialised in Parliament.
Despite the worst weather yesterday folks braved the storms and voted in record numbers.
Corbyn looked a misfit and Bercow looked ill having eaten humble brexit pie.
Let’s hope Boris gets Brexit not Brino!
Congratulations on surviving nonsense and many obstacles Sir John.
December 13, 2019
Mrs Sturgeon says she wants a second referendum, We in the rest of the UK wish a vote in the Scotland Independence Question this time. We were denied it last time. It is our land too.
December 13, 2019
Exactly – sick of hearing what the Scots want. Time we English were asked what we want and maybe we want to be independent from the whinging Scots and see more of English taxes be spent on England for a change.
December 13, 2019
Can we rather have a vote on expelling Yorkshire, not Scotland?
Your proposition is just as silly.
December 13, 2019
MiC
Ah so people not old enough to vote in a referendum are disenfranchised because its their future too but England , Wales and NI aren’t allowed a vote on the breakup of the UK of which they are all a part … got it
ps Yorkshire, so far hasn’t asked for separation
December 13, 2019
Congratulations Sir John on retaining your seat.
My misgivings that your Party’s performance in Parliament post-referendum would have produced a dismal election outcome has proved ill founded. Clearly the electorate considered the prospect of a Corbin/McDonald/Monentum axis too awful to contemplate, neither did they accept the ‘stay in the E.U. ‘ LibDem position.
Now the hard work begins in earnest to conclude a future free trade relationship with the E.U. and deal with the SNP demands.
December 13, 2019
It’s a great result. In addition to the issues you mention we need the Conservative government to deliver real economic change to the less successful parts of the country – tackle poverty and get young people on the property ladder. That will consolidate those spectacular gains in previously Labour seats.
December 13, 2019
Sir John,
Congratulations of your re-election as member for Wokingham. Thoroughly deserved.
Now it looks as though Boris will have a good working majority, please get him deliver the sort of Brexit that any sensible Brexiteer wants. Quick, clean, WTO terms, No WA, No Ā£39 billion. No implementation period.
December 13, 2019
BJ has no excuse to do just that. Apart from promises he’s made. But we know what they’re worth. Let’s see what happens…
December 13, 2019
As you say:- It does need as the PM says to āget Brexit doneā, which means taking back control of our money, borders and laws, and means negotiating that Free Trade Agreement the EU has promised in principle. It also means an early budget, as we are in urgent need of a stimulus, at a time of world slowdown and worldwide manufacturing recession.
Well yes but the dire Boris W/A does not take back Control of the above. Much of the W/A is totally unacceptable – just very expensive handcuffs for the next stage of negotiation.
Marr just on BBC1 now we all need to reflect about what we got wrong – well Marr you got almost everything wrong as did Newsnight, Channel 4, the Today Programme, World at One …. and the rest of green crap, pro EU lefties. A shame we cannot vote him and these people out of their jobs.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations.
Let’s see what a Tory majority can do.
BREXIT
Repeal the Fixed term Parliament act
Put the BBC on a commercial footing – it’s film archive should go to .. the British library. The rest of it, subscription service only.
December 13, 2019
The jucidial appointments commission needs to be completely reformed.
The Blairite criteria for being a judge should be abolished. All appointments under the JAC of the last twenty years should be reviewed.
December 13, 2019
Reform the house of Lords.
Expel, all political appointees from the last thirty years.
All remaining seats, when they become vacant be directly elected for a term of no more than ten years.
December 13, 2019
Sadly, the BBC is just one massive Pension Scheme (with accompanying deficit and liability)…that makes the occasional quality TV programme.
If…and it is a big if…the BBC is ever privatised…the good old taxpayers of this land will be stuck with the Pension Fund liability. The BBC would be unsaleable with the Pension deficit.
December 13, 2019
Why not put the “new” un-funded BBC on Freeview where no one pays any subs? All the channels there are free to view and generate their own funds.
December 13, 2019
Despite what others have previously claimed, this election was all about Brexit as I have said from the beginning.
To those anti-democrats who relentlessly clamoured for a ‘peoples vote’ or ‘second referendum’ You have had your second vote and the answer is clear. “Get Brexit done” Now either shut-up and go away. Or work with the Government to get this process sorted out, as quickly as possible. Three and a half years have already been wasted.
December 13, 2019
A ‘Brucie bonus’ from the election is of course the end Corbyn. The Communist friend of all terrorists and enemy of Britain is toast. The sooner he disappears into retirement (in Venezuela probably) the better.
December 13, 2019
Good morning and congratulations to our kind host. š
I will not hide my disappointment that there will be no BXP representation at Westminster. This in my view will mean that the Tory Party will push through their version of BREXIT, a BREXIT that will be as long a running political sore in the UK as much as our membership of the EU has.
December 13, 2019
To be fair, there was virtually no chance that the BXP would win even a single seat. But even if they’d won 20, they would have been an irrelevance.
December 13, 2019
Sad to see Richard Tice not get in in Hartlepool. The leave vote of 21,000 was split down the middle and allowed the Labour MP to get in again on much much less. The Tories could have been gracious in seats like this and stepped down especially as Fargage gave the Tories a free run in all those Tory held seats. Let’s hope Boris doesn’t do a May and renege on all his tough talk and we end up with Brino i.e. his tweaked May deal which is not what we voted for.
December 14, 2019
This happened in the Hull seats too.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations on your own result – a great relief given what we were reading in the press.
I hope Boris will not squander the victory – the new Govt needs to be bold and radical in making the UK super-competitive post-Brexit. It would be a terrible risk to go into the next election – even if it seems a long way off today – without having delivered real benefits in terms of growth, prosperity, investment etc.
Meanwhile it is great to see the far left Labour Party do so badly given their absurd policies and unpleasant and mendacious campaign. One day there will be a swing to the left in an election and it would be a huge boost to long term confidence in the UK if that alternative was of the more or less rational and sensible social democratic variety and not the nonsensical marxism we got from Corbyn and McDonnell.
December 13, 2019
Boris can now scrap his WA, and go for a clean break. Let us see what is on offer from the EU and back up our bargaining position with what Trump has tweeted.
December 13, 2019
if only he would.
December 13, 2019
Now now John JS for PM
December 13, 2019
Good luck John. Thanks for being a great MP.
Sadly the system is broken, the parties are picking the wrong people as candidates, that’s a fundamental problem.
The people were never going to vote for Stalinist policies.
The people were never going to vote to have a democratic referendum overturned.
Labour lost it, far more than Conservatives won it. Cannot depend on that happening the next time.
The people picked the least worst option.
That does not for me mean support for the sillier Dom Cummings ideas, or the “Northern Powerhouse”, or green crap.
Boris is making a few mistakes already, he should be saying the NHS is not a sacred cow and we need to be able to discuss how to improve healthcare for all moving forward. He should not be promising to meet green targets, when all they do is shift production abroad and increase net world pollution.
But hopefully in among all that there are some good people who can get some genuinely good things done.
State regulators need some properly independent complaints processes, a shake up of the inertia of always picking people like themselves, starting with tanks of the lawn of the corrupt Financial Services Ombudsman.
IR35, remember what you said, you need to deliver.
And immigration, really stop making it easier to import cheaper workers from abroad discouraging Brits from training in those areas. Intra Company Transfer Visas, go back to the topic and resist any pressure to stop talking about it.
Anyways good luck.
December 13, 2019
I suspect Dom Cummings single-handedly won the election for the Tories by advising Johnson against being interviewed by Andrew Neil.
December 13, 2019
Dom Cummings won it for Boris by being an astute analyst
Most of the politicians and their strategists start with what THEY want to happen then try to force people to agree Cummings finds out what people want then amends the strategy to suit. Its also how us entrepreneurs work too
Thats how he captured the working class vote
Where as the marxists had to invent problems that then their marxism solved , problem being their invented problems are seen as nonsense by most people
December 13, 2019
I like Dom I am a fan, but he hasn’t got everything correct, he would benefit a lot from spending more time with people like me, lol I mean pragmatic delivery oriented and less theoretical, etc.
December 13, 2019
Well Done John a Fantastic result
December 13, 2019
Congratulations. You asked the voters to help you take back control – to give you a clean break from the last Parliament, because it is impossible to move forward when you are half-in and half-out of government. Now you have the power to do the same thing for our country.
December 13, 2019
Now Boris has no excuses. Deliver what he has campaigned on, and tackle the list of change required after over 3 years of standstill. Get other things done!
December 13, 2019
You can spin the election result anyway you wish but never forget the last 2 european elections and this general election was, and will always be, about leaving the EU and not negotiating a WAā¦..the peoples mandate is to leave nothing more nothing less
December 13, 2019
Yet again we’re getting the analysis that Remain won.
December 13, 2019
Boris should remember that it’s not only Labour voters who ‘lent’ the Tories their vote.
Brexit Party voters did too.
December 13, 2019
Brexit Party voters are alienated Tories, they have reclaimed their party as well as their country! Great effort, heroic.
December 13, 2019
Yes, Anonymous. I’m a lifelong Conservative voter – but reluctantly I have to agree with you. I wouldn’t have voted Conservative this time if there’d been a BP candidate here. I believe many of us feel that, having been manoeuvred into this position, we must give them a chance.
I just hope that they don’t sell us out so completely to the EU that all our real choices in the next GE (if the EU would then allow one on OUR terms) would be taken away.
I’m glad of the result – but I watch with trepidation, not unalloyed joy.
December 13, 2019
Tomorrow the analysis that the Little Big Horn was a victory for Custer……
December 13, 2019
Anonymous
“Yet again weāre getting the analysis that Remain won.”
Yes I know, they really think that losing is winning and that minority rules over the majority, bless ’em.
December 13, 2019
John, there is already talk of a softer Brexit because of this large majority. I do hope this is wrong. Boris needs to be strong and stand up against the EU. The people have now instructed Parliament in no uncertain terms. We voted out and that is what we expect. Well done to you and our new government. Just make sure Boris gets it right. This is the first time Conservatives have had a chance to prove their worth in many traditional Labour seats. Don’t let them or us down.
December 13, 2019
Indeed FuS especially as the ERG are no longer in a position to hold them to account and the only reason Farage stepped down was because he had been assured Boris was going to go for Canada plus option. Now they’ve got a majority, let’s hope they don’t betray us all and still insist on giving us their tweaked version of May’s rotten deal. A Conservative MP the other morning was actually defending the Ā£39 billion as paying what we owe – unbelievable.
December 13, 2019
It is an ideal result in many ways.
Firstly, the Tories now own Brexit. They make it a success or they own the entire blame when, as I expect, they fail.
Secondly, they have no popular mandate for Johnsonās Brexit. The majority voted for remain / second referendum parties. This guarantees Brexit can be easily undone in future.
Thirdly, Corbyn is toast. Labour now has a chance to rebuild.
Fourthly, Farageās political career is over. Failed again at Westminster, his Brussels platform will soon go. Heāll be on Iām a Celebrity at some point but he is now irrelevant.
Fifthly, the success of the SNP and nationalists in Northern Ireland guarantee that the UK can not leave with a hard Brexit. If Johnson wants a hard Brexit the price is the Union.
Sixthly, the argument in favour of electoral reform has just been cemented. The Lib Dems got 11% of the votes – around a quarter of the Tory total – but only 1/40 of the Tory seat total. The Greens and Brexit Party are also victims of this huge democratic deficit which sees a swathe of the electorate all but unrepresented. Reform is now inevitable.
Finally the collapse of the Tory vote among under 45s appears to be spectacular. This is a dead party walking but one which does not realise it yet.
Iāve long compared Brexit to cancer. The treatment was always going to be painful. Weāve now started chemo. We either recover or die. Either way the Brexit cancer will be gone before long.
December 13, 2019
Poor Andy a lost soul how sad never mind you can always demand another Election next week maybe
December 13, 2019
You can carry on with your rants for another 5 years now andy.
And probably for the next 10 years because Labour won’t claw back the big majority the Conservatives now have.
I hope you feel as bad as I did when Blair got his three election victories.
December 13, 2019
Evidence of the the collapse of the Tory vote among under 45s? None, of course.
Comparing Brexit to cancer is just too distasteful for words. But, then coming from you it isn’t really a surprise.
December 13, 2019
Brexit is surely the require treatment to remove the malignancy of the EU. A cancer that has done such huge damage to the UK for fourth odd years.
December 13, 2019
Andy
The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result
Thats now 5 election/referendums in a row that remain has LOST .
I think we can safely say that the majority want to leave
( ps as people get older and mature they become more conservative) in the mock elections at my daughters primary school the Communist Party won by a landslide because they promised free chocolate )
December 13, 2019
Lets face the fact that without Nigel Farage, there would have been no Referendum and no Brexit at all. Cameron, very reluctantly, was forced into declaring the big event of 2016 only by the threat of UKIP taking away the seats from the Conservatives, at that time.
December 13, 2019
You lost
December 13, 2019
Youāve not included in your analysis Electoral fraud and the majority of the electorate in England and Wales being nobbled by the Russians.
Iām afraid You are still living in the London bubble, I have mentioned before that here in the midlands and the north you wonāt find anyone draped in EU flags shouting āstop Brexitā as the results from yesterday proved. Even the āstop Brexitā man Mr Bray only managed a meagre 949 votes standing as a libdim.
Nearly all of the democracy denier MPās have now been removed from the HoC, so have plenty time on their hands now to reflect on their disgraceful conduct the last 3.5 years.
December 13, 2019
What a peculiar discription for freedom, independance & self determination. I presume you think India & all the African states suffered cancer when leaving the British Empire then.
December 13, 2019
Andy – why does the word ”maundering” spring to mind when I try to read your posts?
I daresay Sir John allows you to appear to give us a little light relief when others are writing serious and thought-provoking stuff.
December 13, 2019
By the way, Andy – perhaps you could explain why the turnout was low in areas with more young people. Couldn’t get out of bed? Had more interesting things to do? Mum didn’t call them in time? Didn’t actually care much about the result? Who knows? You say you’re ”young”. So…
YOU tell us.
December 13, 2019
Andy isn’t young he’s 45, he’s just got an infantile mind
December 13, 2019
Andy
“Secondly, they have no popular mandate for Johnsonās Brexit. The majority voted for remain / second referendum parties.”
The above statement is of course total rubbish. As it happens the election result closely correlates with the 2016 referendum result.
“Farageās political career is over”
Agreed.
“Iāve long compared Brexit to cancer.”
Which is a rather dumb ass and grossly insensitive thing to do, and I don’t think you have any right to make that comparison on behalf of those who suffer from cancer.
Seems to me Andy your’re talking sour grapes. Just as you lost in 2016, you lost this one too. You need to give it a rest mate, you lost get over it.
December 13, 2019
It is, for now, a free country.
I am perfectly entitled to compare Brexit to a cancer – because that it what it is. An abnormal growth which spreads.
You like to say I lost. This is true. The amusing thing is that you still have not figured out that you lost too.
December 13, 2019
I try to remember Churchillās great maxim about magnanimity in victory, but in your case itās very difficult.
On this site you have been predicting 1) the EU wouldnāt remove the backstop so enabling at least in principle a true free trade based Brexit, which they now have, and 2) the Conservatives would be wiped out at this election (although youāve been backsliding on that one since Boris took over!)
Youāve been wrong on both. Youāre going to be wrong on what youāve written here also, because the EU will likely now agree a sensible FTA, and the Country will see the economic benefits of Conservative govt come through as has usually happened in the past.
Scottish separatism will not succeed – once the UK is out of the EU it becomes a much bigger risk for Scots, so they wonāt vote for it.
Weāve had a vote on PR already, we donāt want that either thanks. But we do want equal sized constituencies which we will now at long last get.
As for a mandate. Boris Johnson has just got the biggest mandate of any party for 30 years on a very clear policy. On your argument no British govt has ever had a mandate to do anything as none has ever had 50% of the vote (and nor has any other european governing party).
Have a few drinks over Christmas and come back next year in a calmer mood!
December 14, 2019
I didn’t ask for reform when none of the UKIP candidates became MPs. (Under your proposals there would have been around 70)
December 13, 2019
Congratulations Sir John, that was quite an achievement for you with all of the massive Lib Dem spending campaign locally and standing next to an ex-Tory General Practitioner!
Boris Johnson has a job to do now – it is time to make his mark. There are a lot of ex-labour areas that have put their faith in him DO NOT let them down.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations Sir John on the Tory win and your personal success.
Unfortunately my Labour MP was returned as I suspected she would.
But it was a truly wonderful night to see the likes of Grieve, Soubry, Wollaston, Lee, Gauke, Umunna, Swinson and many other democracy deniers get a sharp lesson in democracy and what happens when MPās donāt listen to the people.
Votes, turkeys and Christmas come to mind.
Shame about Caroline Flint though.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations on the whopping majority.
Please do not waste it. We need urgent reform. Amongst the first things on the list should be the BBC, the house of Lords and the way the courts were able to interfere in what was clearly a political matter.
December 13, 2019
Indeed. And for the economy tax cuts, red tape cuts, cheap energy and get the state out of the damn way.
December 13, 2019
Gerrymandering by the Labour controlled council has turned the safe Tory seat of Chingford and Woodford Green into a marginal.
The following indicates a need for electoral reform:
SNP 1,242,372 = 48 seats
Lib Dems 3,675,342 = 11 seats
With 66% fewer votes than the Lib Dems the SNP won 336% more seats!
How can this disparity be allowed to continue?
Also, I heard that there were cases of people arriving at polling stations to find that someone had already used their vote. Time for some stricter controls,
at the very least a polling card should be required.
December 13, 2019
Please please please no Scottish 2nd referendum. Letās just have five years of stability.
December 13, 2019
BW
…..No, if Sturgeon wants another indy ref she should have it, this time including the English vote as it directly affects us.
December 14, 2019
This would mean a landslide to kick them out. Saving the Barnett formula for the treasury.
December 13, 2019
What a brilliant result, but it comes with a caveat.
Boris himself has comprehensively damned the WA on several occasions but now praises it in spite of the tweaks being minor. Will he now push through this treaty or first amend it to resemble something like a proper Brexit?
If pushed through in its present form then true sovereignty will not have been delivered and the arguments will continue.
December 13, 2019
Indeed well we shall see very soon indeed what Boris is actually made of.
December 13, 2019
Again – read the pledge contained in ‘standup4brexit.com’:
”….and abandoning Theresa Mayās Withdrawal Agreement as dead.”
I hope our new tranche of MPs will renew this pledge, and that our PM will abandon his ”oven ready deal” acknowledging now that it is Theresa May’s dead WA with lipstick. We shan’t even mind his admitting he was trying to bamboozle us with it – so long as it’s all right in the end.
Because if it’s not all right, it’s not the end.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations and I sincerely hope that this government, unlike May’s, will not let us down.
I was amused by the BBC coverage this morning. Rather than being unbiased, the presenters sounded as though they should have been wearing mourning black!
December 13, 2019
Indeed the bias of the BBC was an outrage even this morning they do not realise how out of touch they are. The presenter like Marr and Kirsty Walk do not even realised how biased the BBC is unless they are just lying that is. Such are lefty art grads.
December 13, 2019
Ed Davey and Sal Brinton surely these two are even worse that B******* to Brexit and greencrap pusher Joe Swinson!
Especially Ed Davey (Oxford PPE yet again)
December 13, 2019
LL
The Lib Dems had a MASSIVE opportunity to seize the centre ground from a far left Labour Party and once again they failed. The LD’s are really a pointless party UNLESS they get in someone with a far more astute understanding than they currently posses in their party
December 14, 2019
Indeed if they cannot even push a Corbyn led Labour Party into second place what chance have they got? But all their agenda, like the BBCās, is totally wrong. They are Pro EU, climate alarmist, for even bigger government, even higher taxes and for endless more red tape and PC drivel.
December 14, 2019
They gave themselves away when they revealed that preventing a Labour government mattered more to them than stopping exit from the European Union.
They have always arguably been an enabler of Tory government, and have now put the matter beyond all doubt.
They will not recover, and deservedly so.
December 13, 2019
The conservative party should now acknowledge the tremendous effort of the brexit party in securing the tory winā¦..I would suggest that without brexit party campaign in the midlands and the north there may have been a hung parliament
December 13, 2019
Without the Brexit Party decimating the Tories in the European election, they would still be backing May and Boris and his bird would not be walking through the no 10 door for the next 5 years.
December 13, 2019
Well done Sir. We could do a lot worse than to have you as our next Chancellor. I expect the usual suspects will be here soon to tell us that we didn’t know what we were voting for and how we have to rerun it!
December 13, 2019
Sir John Redwood as Chancellor?
We can but dream.
December 13, 2019
A case of the electorate voting for the least awful I think.
December 13, 2019
Is the SNP socialist, liberal, or pro-free enterprise? We must ask someone.
If they stay in power much longer one of those tastes of power will dominate.
It is likely to go more socialist as the socialist politicians have lost their home and will pose an even greater threat to Scottish people. In fact it is happening.
The SNP, a Labour Party by any name. A fatal mixture of socialism and nationalism. Just keep an ear out for the sound of nasty red bigger boots.
December 13, 2019
The sound of it.
“The SNP, a Labour Party by any name.”
…actually a nationalist party, and a quite extreme one at that.
They threaten our sovereignty, threaten our constitution, threaten to break up our island, threaten our defences. Extremists by any reckoning.
December 14, 2019
All I can say is I’m glad we left Scotland. Ayr has just voted in the SNP. They were always Conservative. I am much happier living in England and hope the Scots aren’t handed more money to stay in the UK. Let them earn it like we have to and let them go without all the freebies for a change.
December 13, 2019
Alec
But look on the bright side, we can now scoff, laugh, and take the piss of Labour, Lib Dems, SNP etc.
Don’t look so damn smug now, do they ?
December 13, 2019
Congratulations, a deserved win. My earnest hope is to see you back as a Minister and in a better position to influence events. Hope Boris sees it that way….
December 13, 2019
Congratulations to Sir John Redwood.
Its been a good night.
(I idly wonder if Labour and the Lib Dems will work out why they did poorly – I guess they’ll get it wrong).
December 14, 2019
Edwardm
Political parties are like long established businesses, when faced with a paradigm shift they carry on trying to make their outdated offering work. It never does and eventually they go bust .
There is a massive “gap in the market” for a new kind of political party in the UK, one that champions democratic change to our outdated systems, one that uses new technology to build manifestos and consensus , one that operates bottom up not top down. iDemocracy is the future , but political types aren’t renowned for being innovative and creative .
December 13, 2019
We’ve heard the promises to take back control of our laws, borders and money (and hopefully fishing grounds too). I hope this doesn’t result in Parliament voluntarily handing back that control!
Now is the time to keep those promises. We’ll be watching, and waiting.
December 13, 2019
A couple of priorities after Brexit and the next budget:
Get the revised constituency boundaries implemented
Reform the BBC in a major way.
December 13, 2019
This is a huge opportunity, and I’m not talking about Brexit specifically.
Please don’t squander it by acting as a substitute for the Labour Party, even in its more moderate phases.
December 13, 2019
Most Labour voters are actually small ācā Conservatives. Patriotic, entrepreneurs, they give their sons to the military, they want law and order . . . We can win them for evermore if we reward their āconservatismā instead of taxing them to hell and back.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations, I look forward to reading your blog and input into UK politics.
I see the brexit party sadly did not gain any seats but here ironically it can be argued the conservative party split the leave vote in some areas. If the system were AV+ we would be seeing a handful of brexit party and a few more conservatives.
I will be interested to see how a strong conservative government works, we have learned the fixed term parliament act is nonsense, we have seen the BBC license is unfair and unwanted, postal votes and voting security needs improvement along with many other jobs in parliament – this parliament should be busy.
I hope sovereignty clauses can be added to the WA2 first, stopping the EU using it to jerk us around is important.
December 13, 2019
So, the Tories have a stonking majority. They can now do whatever they like. Some contributors to this site will now expect a clean and proper Brexit. The course of action consistent with this aim is to scrap the WA Treaty and simply leave on January 31st 2020. But assuming BJ goes ahead with his treaty, then some will still expect that we shall leave on December 31st 2020, either with a basic FTA (that the EU has absolutely no interest in offering), or with no deal at all. It would be very strange if BJ were to ratify the WA Treaty, only to then leave without an FTA. Stranger still if the EU were, in essence, happy to let the UK have its cake and eat it, which would be the effect of the basic FTA argued for by some of this parish. My own view is that something very much less strange will happen…
By the way, I think it a little premature to congratulate the voters Sir John. Let’s just wait and see what your party actually does with its handsome majority…
December 13, 2019
Congratulations are due to Jo Swansong, Jezza Corbyn, Nigel Dodds for making the path so easy, and finally to Nigel Farage for keeping the fire of the Ref still burning.
December 13, 2019
So we give the EU 39 billion euros for nothing and we keep all the criminals they have sent us. Then we have a basic FTA with the EU who have a massive trade surplus with us. How is this having our cake and eating it?
December 13, 2019
You may have misunderstood what I was saying. The point is that signing the WA Treaty then having a Canada +++ deal not only doesn’t make sense, but in fact doesn’t seem to be possible given pledges on level playing fields and regulatory alignment sufficient to allow ‘frictionless trade’. In even simpler terms, the EU is not going to allow the UK to maintain existing trading arrangements AND outflank the EU competitively. The choice is clear; align with the EU, but jump to their tune, or break clean and clear from the EU and compete with them. Guess which the Tories are aiming for…
December 13, 2019
beresford
Agree absolutely, we should not even consider signing the putrid W/A as it stands without first knowing what the second set of negotiations are complete.
“Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed” remember that phrase right at the beginning.
No Deal should still be on the table until all matters and negotiations are resolved and complete.
December 13, 2019
The ERG and the DUP are now dead in the water, as is Farage. This new Conservative cohort looks somewhat centrist to me. Boris’s version of the Withdrawal Agreement is the only hand to play that will lead to an “Ukraine Plus” EU – UK Association Agreement, by December 2020.
Nobody in Downing Street and Whitehall wants a “WTO rules” Brexit, the economic downside risk is far too high. You may be aware that the WTO de-facto ceased to operate last Wednesday. The EU is going to do a Trump with any WTO members that try taking the piss.
I take it you have all read page 48 of the Conservative manifesto and the media comments from the like of R Buckland Conservative MP, who wants to ban tactical voting and turn the UK into a one party state.
December 13, 2019
Your first and second points are surely correct. The WTO and its future are a side issue to Brexit, albeit a significant one in its own right. As for the third point, who knows? The wording is vague. The constitution is clearly broken and reform is essential. But how that can possibly be achieved in any sensible way is beyond me. A constitution requires the broadest of consent. I cannot see how any efforts at reform will be anything but partisan. That we lurch from one constititional crisis to another is inevitable. The prognosis is dire.
December 13, 2019
The ball is now in Boris’s court. A clean Brexit down the WTO route with a draft FTA and continuity under a mutually agreed Art 24 of GATT submission. That way everyone would be happy. Any reversion to WA2 is unthinkable as it is WA1 with a clover leaf. Tie up the loose ends of our future relationship with a treaty under the Vienna Convention.
December 13, 2019
agricola-
Agreed – nothing less will satisfy what the 17.4 million voted for.
December 13, 2019
He doesn’t need to satisfy them, nor the ERG nor the DUP. He’s safe for five years whatever he does, and will get that passed.
Do you not get this?
December 14, 2019
Don’t forget to add the Bruges Group to your list Martin. Boris can concede and soften the old red lines to get a deal with the EU by 31/12/2020. Little chance of him losing a vote now.
I expect some early legislation to repeal the CRAG Act and similar legislation so Treaty making becomes a purely Downing Street competence, with a simple “non-meaningful” yes or no vote in a somewhat reduced competence HoC.
December 13, 2019
yeh….but you know the first the PM will do on the 31st Jan is give Ā£39bn to the EU…….and maybe in 12mts ask for an FTA
December 13, 2019
John, your Government now has five years to improve the lives of people living in the North of England and Wales. Don’t let the voters down. We desperately need jobs in our coastal and rural towns. Stop moving jobs to the cities that has been caused by the Power House of the North policy. Place the new jobs Brexit will create in these deprived areas. Your party has been given a golden opportunity, don’t waste it.
December 13, 2019
Hear, hear. Scrapping the CFP and the CAP will do for starters to revitalise northern communities..
December 13, 2019
Politicians do n to mopve jobs. That is the job of the market.
December 14, 2019
You are wrong. The Government controls the Civil Service that provides hundreds of thousands of jobs. During the 1980s Margaret Thatcher relocated thousands of jobs from the south of the country to the north. This saved huge amounts of money as accommodation was cheap and good quality staff was available. There will be new public sector jobs because we will need to take over roles currently carried out by the EU. I’m suggesting these jobs are located in the deprived northern towns. What’s wrong with that? I live in the north and have seen the damage done by recent Government policy. If politicians fail to grasp the issues, they will fail to get re-elected.
December 13, 2019
As for jobs in seaside areas, I still wonder what happened to all the money piling into Blackpool over two centuries.
December 14, 2019
The Blackpool area has lost over thousand Civil Service jobs over the last few year due to the Power House of the North policy. These jobs have been moved to the Northern cities which didn’t need them and it actually costs more to locate them there.
December 14, 2019
Christine
Governments dont create jobs ( apart from government workers) They dont move jobs anywhere , they dont place then
Most businesses work best in urban areas with high concentrations of customers and supply chain, support services. Rural and more remote areas need to create jobs based on tourism, leisure or services delivered digitally
Its about LOCAL government trying to make their small town or coastal community attractive places to do business. Sadly most local councils haven’t got a clue how to do this. If they want to see an example though Ashford in Kent in the 1990’s was a run down market town with a population of 30,000 and declining industry as rail yards closed. Fast forward to 2019 population 129,000 new college, new creative quarter , shopping mall that draws people from all over Kent, loads of new housing , 1.000’s of new jobs in the creative industries , low cost small office space as well as a brand new crowdfunded Ā£4m brewery etc etc . How did they do this? They engaged people asked them what they needed in order to set up in business there then tried to provide it
December 15, 2019
Logistically Kent is in a much better position than the northern towns. It is near to London and the continent. It is an attractive area to set up a business.
The Government will need to create new jobs to take over processes currently carried out by the EU. The Conservatives have promised to help deprives areas in the north so why not locate these jobs where there is higher unemployment. Seems a no-brainer to me.
You are wrong that the Government doesnāt help create jobs. My own job moved to Scotland because Scottish grants were given to my company to relocate there. Unfortunately, the Government doesnāt consider the damage done to areas from the policies it implements. Three large Government offices have been demolished in my areas with the loss of over 2000 good jobs just to achieve George Osborneās Power House of the North objectives.
December 13, 2019
Another example of just how unrepresentative the UK system of “democracy” is. Another minority mandate government (43.6% does not represent a majority), and another example of how not all votes are equal in the UK (Conservatives +1.2% vote share, +47MPs, LibDems +4.2% vote share, -1MP).
December 13, 2019
44% clearly LEAVE, 12% clearly REMAIN. The leave mandate is large.
December 13, 2019
You lost
December 13, 2019
No single party should have won since none showed themselves to be capable of commanding the support of a majority of those who voted.
December 13, 2019
Does any major party get way above 50% under PR?
No they don’t?
You are playing with statistics.
The more parties there are that stand for election the less is the chance of the winning party getting above 50%.
December 14, 2019
I bet the reverse would have satisfied you.
How many times do we have to go over this ? Remain have lost 5x now under several systems.
December 13, 2019
I believe that in relation to Labour and the Lib Demās the majority of voters simply decided āyou are not listening to us, how dare you not implement what we voted forā
December 14, 2019
One vote in the Western Isles is worth five times as much as a vote in the Isle of Wight. Those 48 seats the Scottish National Socialists have don’t look so impressive in that light.The boundaries need to be redrawn.
December 13, 2019
Imminent surrender of this country as an independent nation to the EU. Oven ready, we are stuffed.
December 13, 2019
Put it differently: this large majority means that the UK government can make decisisons in the interest of the UK economy, and not be held captive by a small group of idealists. Those opposed to a united Europe (with or without the UK) will no longer be able to use the UK as a tool. I expect there to be a pragmatic progression towards a mutually beneficial relationship between the UK and the EU and an end to the WWII rhetoric in some circles.
December 13, 2019
Rien
I Agree, already the EU are moderating their language
December 14, 2019
Bearing in mind the EU was first conceived in WWI to avoid WWII.
It was created to keep one nation in particular under control and did indeed have scope to go beyond the Iron Curtain when we joined in 1973, though clearly the voting population couldn’t possibly have conceived this in 1975.
Just a slight brake on immigration until we settled a bit would have avoided all of this.
Instead our leaders demonised their own people thus jeopardising the whole project.
December 14, 2019
Yes, Johnson is secure enough now not to need to pretend to pander to lunatics, as he did so effectively to get their votes.
December 14, 2019
Martin in Cardiff
Luckily the marxist loonys have been sent to the scrap heap and the wet loons all lost their seats
December 13, 2019
Sad but I agree with your comments the PM will surrender with WA2 and say its in the best interests of the UK……you mark my words
December 13, 2019
I hope that now Boris has got the numbers he will negotiate harder with a no deal threat in the background to get rid of much of the BRINO which is in the ‘withdrawal agreement’. This is ‘oven-ready’ like many a turkey.
December 14, 2019
Let us hope we get something better in Northern Ireland.
December 13, 2019
Remain came bundled with an absurd Marxist agenda lead by a comical ideologue and committed Brexiteer
Both parties are thoroughly disliked but the route away from Brexit was only via a Corbyn led coalition supported by the SNP and deeply uncomfortable Liberals . That few people felt able to pay this price is only democracy for the beneficiaries of this utterly failing system.
Now we will pay for their lies with additional borrowing – there was no happy end to this but I have never felt so hopeless about the future
December 13, 2019
You should learn to have more faith in the British people and their true friends and allies around the world..
December 13, 2019
Well leave the country then. You’ve been nothing but a mis-og.
The EU comes bundled with weird ideology full stop. We are just not allowed to say it without being called headbangers and nutters by the likes of you.
The Lib Dems slumped and their leader was unseated – yet again.
There was the Remainers non-Marxist – and greenist – route to an automatic Remain but it was rejected outright.
Your continual assertions that there is an oppressed majority for Remain are thoroughly discredited and the biggest lie was told by you and the likes of you – that you would abide by the referendum result when you placed your ‘X’.
December 13, 2019
A hung parliament would have been less hopeless ???
December 13, 2019
Benji
Please explain !
December 14, 2019
It seems that Newmania would have been a bit happier with a Corbyn coalition in office this morning.
December 13, 2019
Newmania
“I have never felt so hopeless about the future”
Of course, you don’t have to be part of it if you don’t want to. Your free choice.
December 13, 2019
@ steve – have a care, for I fear we might have stolen his dreams and his childhood.
December 13, 2019
Goodness how sad.
December 14, 2019
Newmania
Oh dear, never mind. You can always go and live in Scotland when they clear off.
December 13, 2019
Boris has secured a big enough majority to send a very powerful message to Brussels. Along with the failure of the LibDems to get many seats and the loss of Jo Swinson- I think Brussels can interpret that as confirmation that the British still want to leave the EU!
I pray that we get a meaningful Brexit, and gradual smashing of the Cultural Marxism that has been allowed to infiltrate our once fine country.
December 13, 2019
Hear hear!
December 13, 2019
Sharon, the other countries’ peoples and leaders have wanted the UK to Leave the European Union for some time now.
It is this country which has tried their patience by requesting repeated postponements.
December 13, 2019
MiC
Correction this country also wanted to leave it was the Labour, LibDem wet tories & the speaker who wanted repeated postponements
December 14, 2019
Your silly Straw Man diverts from the point that the European Union’s leaders are absolutely not desperate to delay or to prevent the UK’s departure, far from it.
The claim that the Government has a large majority for the country to punch itself in the face if it so wishes is hardly any bargaining chip.
Anyone on the Mainland reading such comments would be convinced that the English are not much of a rival in the intelligence league, and therefore not really serious competitors at any level.
December 14, 2019
MiC
Er its not a straw man argument its a correction of you factually incorrect statement as proved by the large vote to leave. I dont dispute they want us to leave
As your knowledge of business, trade or indeed European countries is almost non existent we can sit and laugh at your comments
As most of the “mainland” doesn’t even have skin in the game of advanced technology allowing the duffers that run the EU to try to sideline the UK will get short shrift
Already various EU leaders are making conciliatory noises about working with UK now we have a solid government in place.
I expect to see a radical change in approach from the EU
December 14, 2019
Lib and MIC Agree Libertarian. I notice the EU were also bending over backwards to keep receiving our money without which they would be stumped. Time to tell them we are really leaving and by leaving I mean Leave.
December 15, 2019
libby
“As most of the āmainlandā doesnāt even have skin in the game of advanced technology allowing the duffers that run the EU..”
Pray tell us how these backward ‘duffers’ managed to turn the EU into the world’s biggest, wealthiest trading bloc?
And why we begged to join them in the first place?
December 13, 2019
Me thinks that Parliament has just been handed a timely reminder that The People are sovereign. Ignore us at your peril.
December 13, 2019
They are not.
The UK Constitution says that Parliament is, and nothing else.
December 13, 2019
And who votes in the members of parliament?
December 13, 2019
Congratulations upon your re-election Sir John !
December 13, 2019
We want a proper Brexit. No single market, our fishing grounds back, no CJD and no more money to Brussels. Then just ask them whether they want tariffs. If we can’t agree then WTO. Simple.
December 13, 2019
You’ll get what you are given.
December 14, 2019
Please. Just emigrate.
December 14, 2019
Wait and see.
December 13, 2019
Jeremy Corbyn, Jo Swinson, the Momentum thuggery, the BBC, Tony Blair, John Major, Michael Heseltine, Gary Lineker – your boys and girls took a hell of a beating!
December 13, 2019
A specially pleasing result in Wokingham. Congratulations.
The people’s Blue Boris will hopefully not squander the opportunity he has won in the way that Mr. Blair did through timidity and lack of vision.
December 13, 2019
Sir John. Forgot to say congratulations to you.
Does this mean we can repeal the Human Rights Act in favour of a UK Bill of Rights linked to responsibilities.
December 13, 2019
Thank heavens we voted to reject Mr Corbyn’s marxist policies, and we are not now going the way of Venezuela or Zimbabwe. The diehard marxists in the Labour Party still donāt get it. One of Mr Corbynās compatriots said last night āwe need to change the attitude of the publicā. What he should or course have said is āwe need to change our attitude to the publicā. Zealots never learn, have never learned, will never learn.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations on retaining your seat and seeing off the carpet-bagger. Now help Boris to grow a pair and stand up to the EU. Leave at the end of the transition period, no more concessions, if there isn’t enough time for an FTA then sign GATT24.
December 13, 2019
It was good to hear Boris say in his speech that he was humble that some labour supporters had lent him their votes for 5yrsā¦ā¦.I just wonder how soon he will forget that it was those northern voters that secured his victory, how soon will he forget the referendum result and how soon will he forget the brexit partyā¦and how soon will he forget that brexit means brexit and pursue a WA2
December 13, 2019
“Prime Minister in Waiting”. Ouch!
Akin to the “Go back to your Constituencies and prepare for power”.
Well done Boris!
December 13, 2019
Congrats sirrah! Now it is time to be magnanimous in victory and bring together a divided kingdom…. otherwise, Scotland and NI could go their own way. It’s time to end the divisive rhetoric and become a party for all aspiring people. I would urge you to change your slogan from ‘speaking for England’ to ‘speaking for the UK’.
December 13, 2019
The people decided to leave the EU. Again! And those that attempted to bring down our Brexit have paid the penalty for defying the electorate. Well played the British people.
I read however, that despite a 78 majority in the HoC for Boris and the Brexiteers, there are still some die-hard remainers determined to carry on with their blatant betrayal of democracy. What motivates these people? Certainly not principle more like money, I guess. Now, while someone behind the scenes funds them and their cause, so it will continue. It is an outraged so it is time for our press, even the BBC, to seek out and investigate these coverts, the real deniers of British democracy.
After this new and past repeated failures of the Pollsters and the Polling Gurus to correctly forecast the result, it is time they were all sued under the Trades Description Act. Who actually pays them?
December 13, 2019
Dear Mr. Redwood,
Congratulations to you on your re-election as MP for Wokingham and your party on a tremendous victory.
The one disappointing aspect for me was the loss of conservative seats in Scotland. This will no doubt lead to more calls from the SNP for another independence referendum. Indeed, as I write, Ms. Sturgeon is issuing her first of what will be many tirades against Boris Johnson, Westminster and the nasty English.
Mr. Johnson should not try to appease the SNP and the Scottish people with the offer of more money or more powers through devolution. It is well past time that the Barnett formula was scrapped. There are regions in the rest of the UK that could do with extra funding.
I do not think Mr. Johnson can ignore a call for another independence referendum forever. It does not sit easily to demand independence for the UK from the EU but then deny it for a Scotland that wants to leave the United Kingdom.
To end on a rather flippant note; I like to watch proceedings in the HofC but the thought of having to listen to 49 SNP MP’s carping on about independence fills me with dread. Perhaps, that is a good enough reason to allow another referendum!
December 13, 2019
I disagree completely with your analysis. I am remarkably positive about all this.
I loathe Tory Brexit and all it represents – but now they have no excuse. For years they have blamed everyone else for all our ills. It was the EU, then the judges, then the BBC, then business, then Remainers, then Bercow – a constant stream of blame on others.
Now they are totally exposed. They have nobody left to blame. The failings will all be theirs.
The have not fundamentally redrawn the electoral map. They faced the worse opposition leader in history, they refused to reveal any policies and they have a dodgy man in charge. It will all start unraveling remarkably quickly.
December 13, 2019
@ Andy ” They have nobody left to blame” – oh yes there is! Dame Lucy Doolittle and Dr. Roy Spendlove, both strangely quiet for now but the obstructionist antics of whom have been explored here hitherto.
December 13, 2019
So am I positive, Andy.
The commenters here seem to think that a large majority means a hard exit from the European Union, however.
Varadkar believes the opposite, having chatted to Johnson, and I’m more inclined to believe that.
They won’t like it, but too late. Johnson has their votes.
December 13, 2019
Johnson has never given a stuff about Brexit. He cares about himself and power.
Heās an unpleasant man but he is not stupid. He does not want to crash the economy and no deal will do that. It will also break up the Union.
I think there were be another lengthy extension and then a Norway our deal. With us being a rule taker in significant areas.
December 14, 2019
Disagree. There is lots of scepticism about Boris and the chances of a proper Brexit. What aren’t you reading here ?
Yet again Remain have lost.
Now they want to change the system. The more they cheat the more I know I’m on the right side of history.
December 14, 2019
Gibberish.
December 13, 2019
Well if Remain wanted to play “best of three” they got their answer in no uncertain terms, as this was effectively a second referendum on Brexit.
Case closed I think.
Warmest congratulations to Sir John on a richly deserved reward for all his hard work.
Well batted!
December 13, 2019
It wasnāt. It was a general elections. Had it been a referendum Leave would have lost as remain / second referendum parties got the most votes.
December 14, 2019
Sky headlined it as The Brexit Election.
Lots of lefty losers on TV claiming the Brexit issue was why they lost the election.
The only real Leave party the Lib Dems did poorly again.
Labour’s policy on Brexit was rejected by the voters.
December 13, 2019
Like the SNP thinking the people of Scotland voted to leave the UK when they actually voted to remain in the EU. The Conservative Party should not assume the Country has become Conservative overnight. Boris, whether he acknowledges it or not, owes some of his success to Nigel Farage and the Brexit Party, and likewise anyone who voted to Leave the EU. Conservative Leave MP’s seemed to be a bit thin on the ground. Same in the Labour Party.
In this General Election a vote for the Conservative Party was a vote for Democracy, and that Parliament is accountable to the People and not to itself.
December 13, 2019
JPM,
I am not sure a vote for Conservatives was a vote for democracy. It was only TBP that had policy of respecting referendum and reforming the electoral system (more proportion and unicameral). The Conservative manifesto strongly commits to simply tweaking the current system, it does not commit to democracy.
December 13, 2019
Congratulations on winning in Wokingham.
Now Boris has no excuses, nowhere to hide behind if he takes the thundering majority and mandate and turns it into a whimper when settling terms with the EU.
I don’t hold with being magnanimous in victory, the Conservative Party may have won but nothing has been delivered yet for those who voted to leave and faced years of insult, abuse and deceit. Last night is not yet a victory for us and If the likes of the BBC and other NGOs are allowed to simply get away with their past behaviour we will have won nothing and you politicians will have learned nothing.
December 13, 2019
How long should we tolerate 2 million voters in Scotland telling everyone what to do throughout the UK?
December 14, 2019
Well, just ninety thousand voters in the Tory Party told the whole country that it would have Johnson as PM, didn’t they?
Some as young as sixteen, I read.
December 14, 2019
Seems to have been a wise choice too.
Considering the landslide election victory.
December 13, 2019
Very good news that you held the Wokingham seat. Congratulations. I was hugely relieved that Philip Lee, former Bracknell MP, and later rejected by them, was beaten soundly.
December 13, 2019
Corbyn was the new kid on the block in 2017 up against Theresa May, a TERRIBLE Prime Minister!
Things were very different in 2019 as Labour’s ridiculous Brexit fence sitting and money tree promises were exposed.
Momentum will ensure another far left candidate will replace Corbyn so its important that Boris mow moves the Party to the left or he quite simply will lose all the Labour heartlands voters that won him this election !
December 13, 2019
We should see that Farage was the true hero in this election. He should take his peerage as without his generous standing down of Brexit party candidates the result may have been different. Boris should shake his hand in gratitude.
December 13, 2019
Corbyn and his Momentum pals have been firmly put in their place. Look at their front bench. There is not a leader among them. They say their defeat was down to their position on Brexit but it was much more than that. They need to get rid of the Momentum scouge that has infiltrated the party and go back to a party that truly represents the working man.
December 13, 2019
Congrats JR on your well deserved victory. I thought that it was busy at the polling stations but apparently the turnout was slightly lower than 2017 in Wokingham. Not surprisingly the remainer vote coalesced around the Lib Dem candidate hence the reduced majority but still healthy enough.
Final scores through my letterbox were 18 flyers from the Lib Dems, including letters from Brian Paddick, Sarah Wollaston, and Sam Gyimah!!
zorro
December 13, 2019
Zorro
We had 18 from the LibDems as well, the last one being delivered at 20.00 hrs on Thursday evening, saying we only had until 22.00hrs to vote, to save us from Brexit !!!!!
I think the electoral Commission should perhaps take a look at the LibDems expenditure in this, and some other constituencies which they targeted with a very big push, and I would guess with a very large budget.
Leafletting on this scale does not come cheap !
December 13, 2019
but all that money lost, all those hours leaflet dropping, all that planning for a cosy MP salary – all down the pan. Tough life Libnodemocrats.
December 13, 2019
Do not let the euphoria of a conservative election victory fool you. Boris will not deliver a true, no strings, no tentacles total severance from the EU.
Remember the Globalist Establishment pull the strings.
The carbon neutral, global warming crap and Paris climate accord is a globalist agenda to ‘con’ the population.
Who audits where the money goes?
We can only hope the EU disintegrates first.
December 13, 2019
Listening to our MSM commentators and reporters during the night I was struck by just how often they referred to ‘working class’ areas in the north, amazed that Conservatives could possibly gain votes and Labour lose them. I even heard someone talking about ‘mining towns’.
They are clearly stuck in their own cliched world, as if they imagine there to be thousands of mainly men, trudging daily to the factories and back wearing their flat caps and clogs.
I’m not sure there is a ‘working class’ any more and if there us they are not a lumpen mass; they are individuals who think and act for themselves.
It’s time the chatterers moved into the modern world. Just another another element of the stables to be cleaned out.
December 13, 2019
Could plans start to be put in place to pull the defence/military resource and capability out of Scotland, and of course to define the best future relationship for rUK when Scotland leave? Having a pro-independence party win 80% of the seats in Scotland seems to make an Indy2 referendum a waste of resources. Surely, it is time for Scotland to leave the UK.
December 13, 2019
England should leave Scotland to its own disaster without subsidy from us. No more civil service jobs, no more shipbuilding, no more defence work/jobs, probably a big hit in much less tourism going to Scotland…..
December 13, 2019
JR
“…..and means negotiating that Free Trade Agreement the EU has promised in principle.”
Seriously, can the ungrateful French led EU be trusted to honour it’s promises ?
I think Boris should take advantage of the game changer we have just given him, and start telling the EU how it works.
It might be a good idea to publicly expose the EU’s contempt of our island and our people.
We don’t need the ungrateful EU, we don’t need their laws, we don’t need that rotten WA2 either.
I’d like to think Boris would up the ante now he can’t be held over a barrel…..go for it Boris.
December 13, 2019
Agreed – we need to go on the offensive after soaking it up for 3 years. The first person to re-educate should be Mr Barnier and his ticking clock…. we have a 100 billion per annum trade deficit with them, we should not be paying them for the privilege!
zorro
December 13, 2019
Things are only complicated by as Farage( didn’t want to mention him, but) said, most of the political class and the Main stream Media doesn’t venture outside the M25.
There doesn’t need to be any constraining trade terms or deals, the choosing of whose rules to obey and who is in charge, just mutual respect and cooperation. You trade if you want and you don’t if that’s how you feel – it just needs to be reciprocated.
December 13, 2019
Anyway…. the election result was great and socialism has clearly failed.
It means not being delayed forever by socialism at a red traffic light….
…but fortunately the British are all now on a roundabout, the very embodiment of freedom and capitalism where you go when you can, having made up your own mind instead of being told what to do by socialist traffic light planners.
Of course the communist who was in the audience that evening is leaving next exit which is a very desirable outcome indeed !
Polly
December 13, 2019
Congratulations to one and all.
December 13, 2019
I’d urge the new government to use the next five years to effect a number of constitutional reforms:
1) Abolish the FTPA
2) Reform the HoL and remove its anti-democrats on all sides
3) Formally rescind all the Bercow HoC precedents
4) Complete and enact the planned constituency boundary reform and restriction of MP numbers.
5) Clamp down on election fraud: personation, manipulation multi-postal voting etc.
December 14, 2019
Not reform the HoL. Consign it to the scrap heap.
December 13, 2019
BBC now gone into complete spasm and mourning to analyse where corbyn and labour went wrong. Still can’t accept their own failings.
December 13, 2019
When you become a mouth piece for a the Metro Marxists, there is a tendency only to believe in the hype from your own little bubble and have no respect for alternative points of view. The BBC has lost its purpose and its way, and sadly a lot of the MsM have joined the same discussion group rather than having an independent point of view.
December 13, 2019
Sharon Jagger
“Brussels can interpret that as confirmation that the British still want to leave the EU!”
They can’t wait. They have said for some time now why have you dragged it out for so long? Please go.
December 13, 2019
Maggs
Yep, the EU needs to focus on the French riots ( 56 weeks now, and the German farmers demonstrations, the French pension strikes, the turmoil in Catalonia and the breakdown of law and order in Sweden
It must be very distracting for them when they have so many problems of their own to deal with
December 13, 2019
libby
Nothing to match our own problems of the 132 fatal stabbings so far this year.
I don’t believe anybody has been murdered in the incidents you describe above.
December 14, 2019
libby
Anyone been knifed to death in your litany of ‘presumed’ disasters?
December 14, 2019
Classic whataboutery Margaret.
December 14, 2019
Margaret howard
Yes sadly
43 people in Sweden have died in stabbings , shootings and bombings of innocent victims during 2019
11 people have died in the French protests
850 people severely injured and 2 died in Catalonia
These are just the figures for the riots and troubles and do not include the usual crime statistics . Londons drug wars fuelled murders are appalling , its what happens when you invite different communities to carry out their feuds here
Oh and you should be thoroughly ashamed of yourself for trying to make a ( wrong) political point of murder
SHAME ON YOU
December 14, 2019
The crime rate, generally, across the European Union is pro-rata only about half of what it is here.
It costs the UK about seven percent of GDP, but could be yet more, estimates are difficult.
That is around fifteen times our net contributions to it.
December 14, 2019
MiC
Oh give up boy and go for a lie down
Ive provided the official figures on at least 2 occasions that shows you are TOTALLY WRONG about crime figures
December 15, 2019
libby
What are your official figures on fatal stabbings in the UK for 2019 and how do they compare to other EU countries?
December 14, 2019
Remainers dragged out our leaving.
December 13, 2019
JR – About UK/EU fishing. The following link is for TCW article by John Ashworth.
Describes some of the EU rules, not good ones it seems – is Govt. discussing them now?
Are you familiar with them?
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/eu-makes-sure-it-rules-britannias-waves/?utm_source=TCW+Daily+Email&utm_campaign=c8d3a62979-Mailchimp+Daily+Email&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_a63cca1cc5-c8d3a62979-559873033
December 13, 2019
TCW 13th DEc. edition
December 13, 2019
This may be Johnson’s victory but he needs the whisper in his ear to stay honest.There is everything to lose!
The real victor was public disgust for politics and a reminder that if you ask voters what they want, you better do it!
If Johnson gets it wrong, the Tories are dead.
December 13, 2019
@JR
ā…to āget Brexit doneā, which means taking back control of our money, borders and laws, and means negotiating that Free Trade Agreement the EU has promised in principle.ā
Do all the Members of Cabinet now also agree fully with that meaning?
Regarding any underlying reasons leading to the election results, could it be that there was that āsilent majorityā who realised āDemocracyā had to win the election, because otherwise our form of democracy would be in serious jeopardy. Could it be that the majority of voters were also well and truly p*ssed off with those politicians who thought that a democratic mandate somehow didnāt apply to them.
If so, perhaps those are among the lessons that need continual repetition if our form of democracy is not to wither away.
December 13, 2019
This is such a great speech to the Bruges Group, as good as the one about socialism, traffic lights and roundabouts to the Oxford Union, with just the right amount of energy and sardonic humor to keep everyone listening and concentrating……..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dx1lqhmiScg
But…………..
Why isn’t ”the establishment listening” ?
Why don’t they understand the verb ”to leave” ?
The answer isn’t provided in the speech…. but is it provided by the well known (surely by now) Bruges Group tweet ?
Polly
December 13, 2019
Great, thank you..
Some in the Westminster bubble still don’t get it!
December 13, 2019
“Now this new Conservative majority government has two immediate tasks. It does need as the PM says to āget Brexit doneā, which means taking back control of our money, borders and laws, and means negotiating that Free Trade Agreement the EU has promised in principle. It also means an early budget, as we are in urgent need of a stimulus, at a time of world slowdown and worldwide manufacturing recession. ”
Absolutely,
Raise the anchor,
telegraph the engine room to get the Ship of State underway-
and then steer a steady course 30 degrees to starboard into the wide open blue waters of independance.
December 14, 2019
gregory martin
30 stbd would take us to Scandinavia.
Hypothetically I suppose if the Island could be floated and given propulsion then we could do something about the weather.
December 14, 2019
Tsk, you think the bows are at Kirkaldy? NAh, they’re at Penzance!
December 13, 2019
As a Tory voter in a northern constituency I am pleased that the win was delivered from the Midlands and North (with big vote share increases balancing a share erosion in the south east) and hope those areas finally get a lot more focus that they need and deserve.
Hard Brexiters should listen very carefully to the electorate and not their own echo chambers
December 14, 2019
The Tory gains in the Midlands and the North were from Leave voters who ridicule the remainer term ‘hard brexit’.
‘What’s hard about it?’ they ask sharply. ‘We voted to leave, not to hang about the EU’s coat tails, following its petty rules and regulations that only big business can afford, obeying its tinpot courts, letting continentals plunder the fish in our waters, transfer our industries to eastern Europe, allowing every Tom, Dick and Harry in to exploit in-work benefits and undercut the British worker…’
Middle-class remainers should listen very carefully to the electorate, and not their own echo chambers.
December 13, 2019
Now is the time for the UK government to spell out the realities of democracy UK style. It is obvious to me living in Europe that there is a lack of understanding of the full impact of democracy and in some areas a contempt for it. The EU does not appreciate that an incoming UK government is not bound by any half finished projects of the previous government. They must be made to understand that there is nothing to be gained from any belief they may have that they can pick up on WA2 as if it were a piece of unfinished homework. For a new government in the UK any future agreement is at present a blank sheet of paper. All the above is a dilema for the EU because it is a bureaucracy that operates minus the inconvenience of the democratic process. They possibly consider our election as a change of seats on a bus that lumbers forward on it’s original path.
Once the reality of our democracy is hammered home to them, they may be in a better position to understand that all previous game plays are over and the solution I have offered of WTO terms, an FTA proposal and the use of Art 24 of GATT are a mutually beneficial way to move forward. I leave it to you JR to hammer this home to Boris who is more than capable of appreciating it as a sensible way forward.
Nothing should be allowed to stand in the way of our sovereignty in the process. A gradual extraction from WA2 with all it’s caveats is absolutely unaccepable.
December 13, 2019
Sincere congrats & my deepest thanks Sir John, this country is based on democracy (functioning again), the MANY have spoken not just the FEW …. God bless the silent majority who are the great British public, they saw through the lies and MSM fake news.
To quote PIERS MORGAN: Boris Johnson’s triumph proves democracy-denying radical socialists backed by self-righteous celebrities on Twitter are electoral poison ā and if Democrats fall for the same delusion, Trump will decimate them in 2020.
December 13, 2019
Would it now be fair to say that the Members of Parliament who lost their seats in this election ādidnāt know what they were standing forā?
December 13, 2019
More Marxist Labour controlled thugs on the streets.
Less of the One Nation crap and more getting the police to do their job and cracking down on proper thuggery rather than arresting people for so called non-PC jokes
Purge education of Marxist and PC ideology. Bankrupt Labour and their client state.
December 14, 2019
Yes, it’s a pity in some ways that Labour rely on donations from ordinary working people like me, rather than on rich Russians like some other parties seem to do, isn’t it?
December 14, 2019
If you have evidence of illegal payments to any UK political parties then report them to the authorities.
Or is it just another smear?
December 14, 2019
Martin, I hope it dawns on you soon that this bullying, forceful I am greater morally and more intelligent than you mantra, threatening marches and antagonising people on social media to such a point that people no longer speak their minds to people who think differently to them is an utter turn off to moderate British people. Shouting louder doesnāt make you right.
December 14, 2019
M-I-C,
Your assumption being that domiciled Russians are likely to revert to origins whereas the countless millions of other immigrants will all pass the ‘Cricket Test’ ?
December 14, 2019
The Russian Soul is a unique phenomenom !
December 14, 2019
Martin in Cardiff
You are hilarious
Labour is the country’s richest political party , they paid NO TAX
They receive donations from Unions and big donors such as Goldman Sachs
Anyway heres the official numbers for the election
All registered political parties must submit four weekly reports to the Electoral Commission in the run-up to a general election to show any sums they receive over Ā£7,500.
The figures are:
Labour Party – Ā£3,488,000
Conservatives – Ā£2,967,000
The Brexit Party – Ā£2,250,000
Liberal Democrats – Ā£251,000
Plaid Cymru – Ā£70,000
Green Party – Ā£37,750
If you have a shred of evidence that any party got money from an overseas government of any kind then you need to report it to the authorities
You need to take a break and go and grieve in private
December 13, 2019
This was like June 2016 all over again: decent, patriotic, sensible people with very little, standing up to 24/7 lies and spin from very well off people who ought to know better.
A great shame about Nigel Dodds and Zach Goldsmith. I suppose if the Green Party were prepared to put Corbyn into Downing St, they and the Alliance Party wouldn’t be above ganging up to get more of the IRA elected; and Zach must have faced a filthy dirty Liberal campaign.
A splendid result in Wokingham after all that anxiety. And very well deserved.
Can you tell us Sir John, why the media keep telling us the Queen has asked the PM to form a government? I thought he already was the PM and there already is a government.
Also do we refer to the Leader of the Opposition as such during the dissolution? I noticed they never did.
Reply There is a new government with a new Parliament. The Leader of the Opposition becomes a party leader during the election as there is Opposition in Parliament after dissolution.
December 14, 2019
Congratulations John, well deserved!
December 14, 2019
When I was a leftie I wondered how some people in the NHS could vote for the Right.
Now I am a rightie I wonder how some people in the NHS could vote for the Left.
So, that’s my first and second opinions.
The NHS staff, at least half of them are not to be trusted. Possibly all of them if I’m even-handed about it
This is a major crisis in our NHS. Half to all of them are barking mad
December 14, 2019
I hope you will fight against decarbonisation which is pointless and allows China an industrial advantage. Because UK produces only one per cent of world CO2 nothing we do makes any difference. I pass over the point that CO2 is now shown not to be an important climate driver. Think of the costs and job losses. I have three gilets jaunes in my car.