Current Politics in the United Kingdom

[scoundrel]

Originally Posted by deepsepia

Well, consider this one: the Euro. The UK decided not to join the Euro, back in the day. As a result it can both be in the EU and not in the Euro. That option isn't really available to, say, Italy, Spain or Greece-- having once chosen to be in the Euro, to leave the Euro would carry with it a completely different set of costs, vs never having been in.

Its understandable that leaving the EU doesn't return you to the status quo ante

New experiences and new history does mean that your path has changed and you are in a different place - that is undeniable.

No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.
~ Heraclitus.

Where I tend to balk is when I am told, exactly as if this were not total bullshit, that the free movement of labour is fundamental to a free trade area.

[deepsepia]

Originally Posted by scoundrel

Where I tend to balk is when I am told, exactly as if this were not total bullshit, that the free movement of labour is fundamental to a free trade area.

That's the position of the EU. Frankly, I think its a position that they ought to have compromised on-- its causing many nations other than Britain a lot of trouble.

The part that's harder is the supremacy of the European Court of Justice and the EU Human Rights Convention. In adhering to the EU, the UK was effectively subordinating its Constitution, signing up to permit judges in Strasbourg to decide, at least for some things, what they might or might not do in Westminster.

It gets particularly challenging when you get to the "ever closer Union" language in the Treaty of Rome, which sounds as though its intended that over time powers that presently reside in Westminster will move to Brussels or Strasbourg.

I can understand why a Brit might not like that-- what's harder to understand is why anyone ever thought it was a good idea to sign up for it

[jacques22]

Originally Posted by scoundrel

Where I tend to balk is when I am told, exactly as if this were not total bullshit, that the free movement of labour is fundamental to a free trade area.

Actually, it makes sense and it's very easy to understand why: think about the drivers carrying goods through the Channel tunnel. Free movement of labour allows them to drive from Spain, France or Italy to the UK with no red tape.

With Brexit, they will have to fill in forms, have their papers and goods checked. That's why there has been this suggestion to turn the M20 into a giant lorry park in the event of a no-deal Brexit.
From the Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/politics...brexit-trade):

John James, the chairman of the largest customs clearance agency in the UK, said the government was unprepared for the consequences of leaving the customs union and single market.
The big problem was not random customs checks, but the clearance documentation required for every consignment, he added.
James said a new system for third-country trade being introduced by HMRC in January required 84 data fields to be filled for customs purposes – 34 more than the current system.
Each form takes 10-15 minutes to fill out and there was no sign of HMRC recruiting staff in Dover or training them, he added.
Before the single market was established in 1993, there were 300 customs officers; there are now 24 in east Kent, James said.
There were also previously 185 customs clearance agents doing the paperwork. “Today, there are only 17, and only five of them of any real size operating a 24-hours-a-day service,” he said.
“In 1993, there were between 2m and 2.5m entries; post-Brexit, there will be somewhere in excess of 25m, this including Dover and Eurotunnel. It is obvious to everyone that customs clearance will be woefully inadequate.”

[scoundrel]

Originally Posted by deepsepia

I can understand why a Brit might not like that-- what's harder to understand is why anyone ever thought it was a good idea to sign up for it

Edward Heath might have been able to answer that one, perhaps. He certainly signed Britain up for this and lied about it when questioned on whether the EEC (as it used to call itself) was an existential threat to Britain as a nation. He admitted in later years that he knew about the federalist agenda all along, having denied in the 1970s that there was a federalist agenda. His admission wasn't a confession, it was a boast over how he had successfully implemented change by concealing the truth. Men have been hanged, drawn and quartered for much less than this. I would be intrigued to know why he thought this was the thing to do and what his motives were.

But for most of us, it was never a good idea to sign up for the forfeiture of our sovereignty and our nationhood, It is just that we were never told the truth about this and found it out the hard way. Then Cameron called a referendum and naively assumed that the people would support continued EU membership, without him taking time out to produce a strong case for EU membership. When push came to shove, the Remain side lost the argument, partly because we knew over 43 years that we had been sold out.

[palo5]

Originally Posted by scoundrel

But for most of us, it was never a good idea to sign up for the forfeiture of our sovereignty and our nationhood

What did you forfeit and how?

[haroldeye]

The ability to hold OUR elected politicians to account. We lost it because we believed the lies we were told.

[deepsepia]

Originally Posted by palo5

What did you forfeit and how?

They lost sovereignty and the paramount authority of the British Constitution. The European Court of Justice can and does order Britain to do things that no foreign Court could have ordered before, things which no foreign Court can order to, say, the US, Canada or Australia.

Australia is a case in point as it has a rather strict border policy. There's been some grumbling about at the UN, but no one can actually order them to do differently.

See: "The European court of human rights’ judgments that transformed British law"
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2014...ed-british-law

. . . for many kinds of cases, Britain's "Supreme Court" is now in France.

[Jota]

I'd rather Scotland leaves the UK.


The democratic deficit in the UK union is much greater than it is for member countries in the European union. In the EU at least each country has a vote.


Scotland has to do what England wants time and time again. We have yet another dysfunctional tory party who are propped up by the HillBilly Taliban, the DUP, foisted upon us by people who think Jacob Rees-Mogg is an actual human being. Who the fuck knew anyone like him?



It's over 60 years since Scotland voted tory and yet, here we are, with another tory government.


Unionists claim Scotland is too poor to run it's own affairs and in the same breath say we're better together but only in their minds is Scotland being poor a resounding endorsement of Westminster rule. I regard Westminster rule as largely a failure, a catalogue of missed opportunities and just wrong headed in many ways. Belligerent unionism writ large in the form of the tories and DUP, the ugly face of Britain.



Just across the north sea is a country with the same population, that has drawn almost the same amount of oil from it's own sector and that country has a sovereign wealth fund of 1 trillion dollars and it's rising by around 5% a year.
They don't need Westmisnter to run their own affairs and they're lucky it doesn't because if it did they have no wealth fund.


Norway takes over twice the revenues from oil extracted than the UK does in it's sector. We've handed it over to the private sector for the few to benefit and not the many.


A nations resources should belong to all of that nation and not just this generation but generations to come. The tory parties greed first approach is short sighted and ultimately selfish but that's what you expect from sellservatives.

[Jota]

It holds us to account for legally binding treaties we've signed up to.


It imposes nothing that we haven't signed up to. The bullshit that they're sitting there ordering us around is a nonsense made up by the billionaires behind the express and mail.


I also note at the first opportunity to embrace our sovereign parliament the brexiters did everything in their power to avoid that sovereignty being used, going as far as to brand people enemies of the state and traitors.


If that's the kind of future sovereignty we've got to look forward to under the new brexit regime then I will not be happy.

[deepsepia]

Originally Posted by Jota

It imposes nothing that we haven't signed up to. The bullshit that they're sitting there ordering us around is a nonsense made up by the billionaires behind the express and mail.

I've got no dog in this fight - am an American-- put that plainly isn't correct.

No foreign Court can order the US, Canada or Australia to change its immigration policy etc.

You'll note the article I cited is from the Guardian not at all the same thing as "the express and mail" you refer to.

See:
"The European court of human rights’ judgments that transformed British law"
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2014...ed-british-law

If you look at these cases, you'll find a Court in Strasbourg with authority over the UK in a manner which no foreign court has over the US, Canada and Australia.