UK butt of the joke as Germany welcomes Brexit-ing firms with open arms
Germany’s finance minister Olaf Scholz was cracking jokes at the UK’s expense on Friday during his first public appearance in Britain, where he outlined how his country was welcoming Brexit-ing businesses with open arms. “Regardless of the outcome of Brexit, Germany and the United Kingdom will always be friends and partners … We were always very impressed by British pragmatism. We were,” he said with a smile, leading to a round of laughs among business attendees at the event in London. Scholz outlined how many businesses, especially in the financial services industry, were moving operations and assets over to Germany in a bid to avoid Brexit-related risks. Germany was doing everything possible to accommodate them, which included helping them set up quickly and confidentially, he said. “Many of the companies we [meet] with … are now taking parts of their businesses to places in Europe. A huge part of them are [coming] to Frankfurt and Germany … They have to be where the market is, outside the United Kingdom,” he said. “We decided that we will help all the companies [coming] to Germany.” Brexit uncertainties have forced financial services companies to move roughly £800bn in assets from the UK into Europe, according to a report last month from EY. About 2,000 new European roles were created in response to Brexit, with Frankfurt among the most popular locations.
Brexit crisis command centre starts hiring civilians
The government has started to recruit civilians to work in an emergency command and control centre being set up to make sure Britain runs smoothly in the aftermath of a potential no-deal Brexit. Briefing notes issued by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) to recruitment agencies state the EU Exit Emergencies Centre (EUXE) could stay open “potentially for two years”. The chief executive of the civil service, John Manzoni, has already said it is looking to second 5,000 civil servants, with volunteers sought in non-Brexit departments including the Department for Education and the Department for International Development. But with 50 days to go to Brexit, the civil service is widening the net to recruit external contractors to help with what appears to be a military-style “Gold command”, which will operate out of offices close to Westminster.
Tokyo confident it can secure better terms from the UK than it did in discussions with EU
Businesses desperately need clarity over Brexit Moving from free trade to WTO terms alarms exporters Lack of trade defences for no-deal Brexit alarms MPs
Tokyo confident it can secure better terms from the UK than it did in discussions with EU
Businesses desperately need clarity over Brexit Moving from free trade to WTO terms alarms exporters Lack of trade defences for no-deal Brexit alarms MPs
Tokyo confident it can secure better terms from the UK than it did in discussions with EU
Businesses desperately need clarity over Brexit Moving from free trade to WTO terms alarms exporters Lack of trade defences for no-deal Brexit alarms MPs
We will rollover 40 trade deals by a minute past midnight on 30th March.
Bit worried exactly what you are going to do with your life when its all over and we have actually left ..it will leave a big void ...perhaps we can start a shopping debate ?
Tokyo confident it can secure better terms from the UK than it did in discussions with EU
Businesses desperately need clarity over Brexit Moving from free trade to WTO terms alarms exporters Lack of trade defences for no-deal Brexit alarms MPs
We will rollover 40 trade deals by a minute past midnight on 30th March.
Bit worried exactly what you are going to do with your life when its all over and we have actually left ..it will leave a big void ...perhaps we can start a shopping debate ?
Nigel Farage has hinted at becoming leader of the Brexit Party after it was officially approved. The Eurosceptic party was formally recognised by the Electoral Commission on 5 February, allowing it to field candidates at upcoming elections. The former UKIP leader said he would stand as a candidate for the new party in May's European Parliament elections if Brexit is delayed.
Brexit firm with no ships has ferries contract cancelled
A firm with no ships that was to ensure ferries kept crossing the Channel in a no-deal Brexit has had its contract cancelled. Seaborne Freight's contract worth £13.8m had attracted widespread criticism after it emerged the firm owned no vessels suitable for carrying goods or vehicles. The Department for Transport said it had decided to terminate the Seaborne's contract after Irish company Arklow Shipping, which had provided backing to the deal, stepped away. A DfT spokeswoman said: "Following the decision of Seaborne Freight's backer, Arklow Shipping, to step back from the deal, it became clear Seaborne would not reach its contractual requirements with the Government.
Tokyo confident it can secure better terms from the UK than it did in discussions with EU
Businesses desperately need clarity over Brexit Moving from free trade to WTO terms alarms exporters Lack of trade defences for no-deal Brexit alarms MPs
We will rollover 40 trade deals by a minute past midnight on 30th March.
According to the Financial Times, talks between Britain and Japan on a new trade deal after Brexit have "stalled" - highlighting what the paper sees as the UK's broader struggle to roll over existing EU trade agreements, "let alone secure anything better". Japanese officials, it says, have been instructed to extract "every advantage possible", as Tokyo is confident it can negotiate more concessions from the UK than those it has agreed with the EU.
Brexit: UK ‘forcing poor nations into risky trade deals’
Ministers accused of pressure on developing nations to 'sign up blind’ – without knowing if rollover deals will prove to be second-rate
Some of the world’s poorest countries are being forced to agree potentially damaging trade deals with the UK by government “threats” in the rush to Brexit, campaigners say. Liam Fox, the international trade secretary, is accused of piling pressure on developing nations to “sign up blind” – without knowing the value of the deals – with a warning they will otherwise be lost.
Just three of the 40 agreements the UK enjoys through EU membership, covering 71 countries, have been successfully “rolled over” – as the government promised – with Brexit day just seven weeks away.
Now the Department for International Trade is under fire for telling the countries concerned they risk punishing tariffs on crucial exports to the UK, unless they re-sign the deals in time.
Among them are Ghana, which relies on banana sales, Mauritius (tuna), Kenya (flowers), Cote d’Ivoire (cocoa), Namibia (grapes and beef), Swaziland (sugar), and scores of other developing countries in Africa, the Caribbean and Central America.
And, says the fair trade charity Traidcraft Exchange, they risk a legal challenge at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) under an extraordinary plan to treat EU parts as originating from the UK.
“The continuity agreements are being rushed because of the threat of no deal. Countries are being asked to sign up blind,” said Liz May, the charity’s head of policy. Watch more
“Instead of acknowledging this difficulty, the government is relying on developing countries being compelled to sign up at the last minute, rather than risk high tariffs being slapped on their key exports.
“This type of bad-faith negotiating – using implicit threats to get countries ‘over the line’ – is not a great way to start the UK’s independent trade policy.”
No developing country has gone public with criticism of the UK’s approach, but some are believed to have objected privately and displayed their unhappiness by refusing to re-sign the deals so far.
Crucially, food products, particularly bananas, sugar and beef, have among the highest tariffs if a country must trade on WTO rules, without a preferential deal. Mr Fox himself acknowledged the risk to developing countries from Brexit after his own department floated a proposal to abolish all tariffs if the UK crashes out of the EU, to avoid soaring inflation. He told a committee of MPs it would “erode preferences for developing countries, because they would lose the ability to take the advantage that is conferred by lower tariffs”. The “threats” are the latest controversy to erupt over the failure to secure the deals – worth 12 per cent of the UK’s total trade – with the clock ticking down to Brexit day. The focus has been on the danger of higher prices for British shoppers, and job losses in this country, but Traidcraft said the implications were potentially more severe for developing nations with deals.
Corbyn and May's Brexit poker game is looking like a grand bluff – but no one has a decent hand
On the face of it, the UK is hurtling towards a disastrous cliff edge exit from the EU on 29 March, and Theresa May is doing nothing to halt it. It also appears, after the prime minister’s talks in Brussels yesterday, that the EU and UK are poles apart, with precious little chance she will win the changes to the Irish backstop needed to secure a Commons majority. And it looks, after Jeremy Corbyn’s “constructive” letter to May, that he is prepared to support a revised Brexit deal, boosting the chances that one might win Commons approval.
Yet there are two parallel worlds of Brexit; perception and reality rarely meet. The three above statements are one way to read the current position, but I think they are all wrong.
First, while May will keep a no-deal exit in play to maximise pressure on the EU and MPs, cabinet ministers are convinced she has no intention of crashing out and will eventually ask the EU to extend the Article 50 process. She hopes to first win a Commons majority for a revised agreement, so she would need only a “technical” extension lasting a few weeks to push the necessary legislation through parliament.
Matters could yet be taken out of May’s hands if MPs vote for a Bill allowing them to force her to seek such an extension. They will have another opportunity next Thursday, in another series of votes on Brexit, although a second “meaningful” vote on May’s deal will be delayed until after yet more EU-UK negotiations.
Second, the EU is more flexible than its uncompromising public stance suggests. May left Brussels convinced that everyone there wants to avoid “no deal”. EU leaders have one last card: probably a legally-binding assurance that the backstop is temporary. But they will want to play it only when they are confident it would guarantee a Commons majority for the agreement. They do not trust May’s promise yesterday that she can deliver one. They worry that if they use their last card too early in this game of poker, the Tory Eurosceptics will call their bluff and come back for more, as they always do.
Third, Labour’s olive branch is not nearly as generous as it seems. To misquote The Godfather, Corbyn made May an offer she can refuse. If she opts for a permanent customs union, she will alienate some of the Tory MPs who voted for her deal last month and have no hope of winning round the 118 who opposed it. In her formal response, she will likely welcome Corbyn’s move and offer to explore his proposals in a second meeting with him.
However, allies insist May remains opposed to a customs union that, as well as threatening to split her party, would prevent trade deals with non-EU countries, which she sees as one of Brexit’s main benefits. Privately, May doubts that Corbyn could deliver Labour’s 256 MPs. The backlash from Labour’s pro-Europeans, who accuse him of ditching party policy on a Final Say referendum and facilitating a “Tory Brexit”, suggests she is right. Some Labour MPs may soon resign the party whip.
Theresa May didn’t take long to confirm she’s lost all grip on reality Despite his conciliatory tone, I doubt Corbyn will ever walk through the same division lobby as May on Brexit. His strategy all along has been to neither enable, nor block Brexit. I suspect he wants it to go ahead, but without his fingerprints on it. So his missive will encourage those Labour MPs who might back a revised May deal.
One key figure, Lisa Nandy, MP for Leave-voting Wigan, reckons that 40-60 Labour colleagues might vote for one if May embraced a customs union. Corbyn has edged towards a Norway Plus agreement, inside the single market and a customs union, to the delight of those Labour and Tory backbenchers who insist there is a natural Commons majority for their “Common Market 2.0” Plan. Pro-EU cabinet ministers would also welcome this and think May might end up there as a last resort, but for now, she remains wedded to her deal. Corbyn has weakened May’s hand in Brussels, which likes his plan.
Ironically, Corbyn’s intervention might also help the prime minister win Tory votes. He has made it easier for her to present the choice to her Tory critics as: back my deal, or the Commons will approve a soft Brexit with Labour’s support. Indeed, I’m told she was already planning to make this very move. As one cabinet minister put it: “She doesn’t want a customs union, but she is preparing to threaten one.” This could push some Tory opponents into holding their nose and voting for her agreement. It’s hardly a great sales pitch: vote for my imperfect deal or get something much worse. But, aided by a nod and a wink from Corbyn to Labour backbenchers, it might just work.
Three cheers to Donald Tusk – who by confronting the rabid Brexiteers has shown us what leadership looks like
Donald Tusk is an unlikely hero but after his latest intervention he’s become one of mine. In case you’ve been hiding under a rock, Tusk yesterday publicly wondered “what that special place in **** looks like, for those who promoted Brexit, without even a sketch of a plan how to carry it out safely”. For his sins, people like Theresa May’s deputy dog David Lidington have been falling over themselves to attack the European Council president for indulging in undiplomatic language. His party’s Brexiteer yobbos have gone further still. They’ve been busily blowing fuses. It’s a wonder we haven’t seen a heart attack or two.
That the Brexiteers, the Conservative Brexit Party, and the Labour Softer Brexit Party, still don’t have a clue and continue to talk to themselves while gazing at their navels and dreaming up more unicorns than you’ll find at a Comic Con convention in an attempt to conceal that the inconvenient truth is just an undiplomatic fact.
The Commons should be sitting until midnight, not mid-afternoon The only shocking thing about what Tusk said is it’s taken this long for someone of real consequence to say it. It wasn’t just for that reason that Tusk had me cheering him on, however. He also raised something else that May, her Philip K **** dystopia of a cabinet, and the rabid rent-a-gobs behind her, also consistently ignore.
Here’s some more undiplomatic language for them: those who criticised him for saying that are talking utter b******s. All of them.
There are lots of us in this country, millions in fact, who believe we should get a vote before they recreate the economy that existed immediately after the Wall Street Crash, destroy the NHS, trash any hope of a decent future for our children, risk the lives of people on long-term medication and empty the shelves of our supermarkets. There are lots of us that want to remain in the EU, who manage to combine being European and British without too much fuss, and have been looking on in horror at what’s been happening. Tusk recognising that fact in his press conference was welcome because we’ve largely been airbrushed out of the British political discourse by people who would strip our European identity from us.
In so doing he brutally exposed the failure of Britain’s opposition parties to provide an effective opposition to a suicidal project and to stand up to the xenophobes and f***wits that are driving it and have had it almost all their own way since this whole thing got started.
Small wonder that there’s been so much squealing in response. The sad fact is that we know what Tusk’s special place in **** will look like. It will be the Britain the Brexiteers are creating, a tolerably successful nation tripping over its extremists’ pants and getting its nose rubbed in the dirt.It’d be nice if Tusk’s intervention instilled a bit of fire into someone beyond the usual suspects because we’re now perilously close to the iceberg. Unfortunately, there’s been scant sign of it happening. Tusk famously used to be a football hooligan. The problem Britain faces is its thugs aren’t just in the stands. They’re on the pitch refereeing the game, looking on with sightless eyes as the best players get their legs broken. Faced with that, isn’t it better to go down fighting than to cry regretful tears after the event?
Thin-skinned Brexiteers can’t handle a bit of salty language from Tusk This is more widely known outside the circle of the Osama bin Brexit fantasists beloved of the BBC than you might think. It’s just that they’re too scared to give voice to it, so most of them mutter under their breath and do what their limp leaderships tell them to do.
Have you ever talked to any leave voters in a social setting outside of your home ? You do realise , that these examples you are cherry picking from the media and the internet are extremes ?
Have you ever talked to any leave voters in a social setting outside of your home ? You do realise , that these examples you are cherry picking from the media and the internet are extremes ?
They voted 70% in favour of leaving. I have heard many of the comments that were made many times before. The UKIP fella was pretty typical. Watch the next one,
Have you ever talked to any leave voters in a social setting outside of your home ? You do realise , that these examples you are cherry picking from the media and the internet are extremes ?
They voted 70% in favour of leaving. I have heard many of the comments that were made many times before. The UKIP fella was pretty typical. Watch the next one,
Have you ever talked to any leave voters in a social setting outside of your home ? You do realise , that these examples you are cherry picking from the media and the internet are extremes ?
They voted 70% in favour of leaving. I have heard many of the comments that were made many times before. The UKIP fella was pretty typical. Watch the next one,
Have you ever talked to any leave voters in a social setting outside of your home ? You do realise , that these examples you are cherry picking from the media and the internet are extremes ?
They voted 70% in favour of leaving. I have heard many of the comments that were made many times before. The UKIP fella was pretty typical. Watch the next one,
So the answer is no you haven't then .
I have spoken to lots of leave voters.
Spoken as in the physical act as opposed to typing on a forum ? .......If you had , and you didn't have an obvious agenda , then logic would say you would want to provide a balanced view of leavers , rather than a populus media portrayal. Posting extreme ukip leave voters videos doesnt tell the story of the majority of that camp , as you well know .
Comments
Germany’s finance minister Olaf Scholz was cracking jokes at the UK’s expense on Friday during his first public appearance in Britain, where he outlined how his country was welcoming Brexit-ing businesses with open arms.
“Regardless of the outcome of Brexit, Germany and the United Kingdom will always be friends and partners … We were always very impressed by British pragmatism. We were,” he said with a smile, leading to a round of laughs among business attendees at the event in London.
Scholz outlined how many businesses, especially in the financial services industry, were moving operations and assets over to Germany in a bid to avoid Brexit-related risks. Germany was doing everything possible to accommodate them, which included helping them set up quickly and confidentially, he said.
“Many of the companies we [meet] with … are now taking parts of their businesses to places in Europe. A huge part of them are [coming] to Frankfurt and Germany … They have to be where the market is, outside the United Kingdom,” he said. “We decided that we will help all the companies [coming] to Germany.”
Brexit uncertainties have forced financial services companies to move roughly £800bn in assets from the UK into Europe, according to a report last month from EY. About 2,000 new European roles were created in response to Brexit, with Frankfurt among the most popular locations.
https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/uk-butt-joke-germany-welcomes-brexit-ing-firms-open-arms-121844115.html
The government has started to recruit civilians to work in an emergency command and control centre being set up to make sure Britain runs smoothly in the aftermath of a potential no-deal Brexit.
Briefing notes issued by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) to recruitment agencies state the EU Exit Emergencies Centre (EUXE) could stay open “potentially for two years”.
The chief executive of the civil service, John Manzoni, has already said it is looking to second 5,000 civil servants, with volunteers sought in non-Brexit departments including the Department for Education and the Department for International Development.
But with 50 days to go to Brexit, the civil service is widening the net to recruit external contractors to help with what appears to be a military-style “Gold command”, which will operate out of offices close to Westminster.
https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/brexit-apos-no-deal-apos-104432699.html
Tokyo confident it can secure better terms from the UK than it did in discussions with EU
Businesses desperately need clarity over Brexit
Moving from free trade to WTO terms alarms exporters
Lack of trade defences for no-deal Brexit alarms MPs
https://www.ft.com/
We will rollover 40 trade deals by a minute past midnight on 30th March.
Nigel Farage has hinted at becoming leader of the Brexit Party after it was officially approved.
The Eurosceptic party was formally recognised by the Electoral Commission on 5 February, allowing it to field candidates at upcoming elections.
The former UKIP leader said he would stand as a candidate for the new party in May's European Parliament elections if Brexit is delayed.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/brexit/nigel-farage-hints-at-brexit-party-leadership/ar-BBTlQwC?ocid=spartandhp
A firm with no ships that was to ensure ferries kept crossing the Channel in a no-deal Brexit has had its contract cancelled.
Seaborne Freight's contract worth £13.8m had attracted widespread criticism after it emerged the firm owned no vessels suitable for carrying goods or vehicles.
The Department for Transport said it had decided to terminate the Seaborne's contract after Irish company Arklow Shipping, which had provided backing to the deal, stepped away.
A DfT spokeswoman said: "Following the decision of Seaborne Freight's backer, Arklow Shipping, to step back from the deal, it became clear Seaborne would not reach its contractual requirements with the Government.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/brexit/brexit-firm-with-no-ships-has-ferries-contract-cancelled/ar-BBTmsVp?ocid=spartanntp
According to the Financial Times, talks between Britain and Japan on a new trade deal after Brexit have "stalled" - highlighting what the paper sees as the UK's broader struggle to roll over existing EU trade agreements, "let alone secure anything better".
Japanese officials, it says, have been instructed to extract "every advantage possible", as Tokyo is confident it can negotiate more concessions from the UK than those it has agreed with the EU.
Ministers accused of pressure on developing nations to 'sign up blind’ – without knowing if rollover deals will prove to be second-rate
Some of the world’s poorest countries are being forced to agree potentially damaging trade deals with the UK by government “threats” in the rush to Brexit, campaigners say.
Liam Fox, the international trade secretary, is accused of piling pressure on developing nations to “sign up blind” – without knowing the value of the deals – with a warning they will otherwise be lost.
Just three of the 40 agreements the UK enjoys through EU membership, covering 71 countries, have been successfully “rolled over” – as the government promised – with Brexit day just seven weeks away.
Now the Department for International Trade is under fire for telling the countries concerned they risk punishing tariffs on crucial exports to the UK, unless they re-sign the deals in time.
Among them are Ghana, which relies on banana sales, Mauritius (tuna), Kenya (flowers), Cote d’Ivoire (cocoa), Namibia (grapes and beef), Swaziland (sugar), and scores of other developing countries in Africa, the Caribbean and Central America.
And, says the fair trade charity Traidcraft Exchange, they risk a legal challenge at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) under an extraordinary plan to treat EU parts as originating from the UK.
“The continuity agreements are being rushed because of the threat of no deal. Countries are being asked to sign up blind,” said Liz May, the charity’s head of policy.
Watch more
“Instead of acknowledging this difficulty, the government is relying on developing countries being compelled to sign up at the last minute, rather than risk high tariffs being slapped on their key exports.
“This type of bad-faith negotiating – using implicit threats to get countries ‘over the line’ – is not a great way to start the UK’s independent trade policy.”
No developing country has gone public with criticism of the UK’s approach, but some are believed to have objected privately and displayed their unhappiness by refusing to re-sign the deals so far.
Crucially, food products, particularly bananas, sugar and beef, have among the highest tariffs if a country must trade on WTO rules, without a preferential deal.
Mr Fox himself acknowledged the risk to developing countries from Brexit after his own department floated a proposal to abolish all tariffs if the UK crashes out of the EU, to avoid soaring inflation.
He told a committee of MPs it would “erode preferences for developing countries, because they would lose the ability to take the advantage that is conferred by lower tariffs”.
The “threats” are the latest controversy to erupt over the failure to secure the deals – worth 12 per cent of the UK’s total trade – with the clock ticking down to Brexit day.
The focus has been on the danger of higher prices for British shoppers, and job losses in this country, but Traidcraft said the implications were potentially more severe for developing nations with deals.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-trade-deal-liam-fox-eu-tariffs-exports-africa-central-america-caribbean-a8770391.html
On the face of it, the UK is hurtling towards a disastrous cliff edge exit from the EU on 29 March, and Theresa May is doing nothing to halt it. It also appears, after the prime minister’s talks in Brussels yesterday, that the EU and UK are poles apart, with precious little chance she will win the changes to the Irish backstop needed to secure a Commons majority.
And it looks, after Jeremy Corbyn’s “constructive” letter to May, that he is prepared to support a revised Brexit deal, boosting the chances that one might win Commons approval.
Yet there are two parallel worlds of Brexit; perception and reality rarely meet. The three above statements are one way to read the current position, but I think they are all wrong.
First, while May will keep a no-deal exit in play to maximise pressure on the EU and MPs, cabinet ministers are convinced she has no intention of crashing out and will eventually ask the EU to extend the Article 50 process. She hopes to first win a Commons majority for a revised agreement, so she would need only a “technical” extension lasting a few weeks to push the necessary legislation through parliament.
Matters could yet be taken out of May’s hands if MPs vote for a Bill allowing them to force her to seek such an extension. They will have another opportunity next Thursday, in another series of votes on Brexit, although a second “meaningful” vote on May’s deal will be delayed until after yet more EU-UK negotiations.
Second, the EU is more flexible than its uncompromising public stance suggests. May left Brussels convinced that everyone there wants to avoid “no deal”. EU leaders have one last card: probably a legally-binding assurance that the backstop is temporary. But they will want to play it only when they are confident it would guarantee a Commons majority for the agreement. They do not trust May’s promise yesterday that she can deliver one. They worry that if they use their last card too early in this game of poker, the Tory Eurosceptics will call their bluff and come back for more, as they always do.
Third, Labour’s olive branch is not nearly as generous as it seems. To misquote The Godfather, Corbyn made May an offer she can refuse. If she opts for a permanent customs union, she will alienate some of the Tory MPs who voted for her deal last month and have no hope of winning round the 118 who opposed it. In her formal response, she will likely welcome Corbyn’s move and offer to explore his proposals in a second meeting with him.
However, allies insist May remains opposed to a customs union that, as well as threatening to split her party, would prevent trade deals with non-EU countries, which she sees as one of Brexit’s main benefits. Privately, May doubts that Corbyn could deliver Labour’s 256 MPs. The backlash from Labour’s pro-Europeans, who accuse him of ditching party policy on a Final Say referendum and facilitating a “Tory Brexit”, suggests she is right. Some Labour MPs may soon resign the party whip.
Theresa May didn’t take long to confirm she’s lost all grip on reality
Despite his conciliatory tone, I doubt Corbyn will ever walk through the same division lobby as May on Brexit. His strategy all along has been to neither enable, nor block Brexit. I suspect he wants it to go ahead, but without his fingerprints on it. So his missive will encourage those Labour MPs who might back a revised May deal.
One key figure, Lisa Nandy, MP for Leave-voting Wigan, reckons that 40-60 Labour colleagues might vote for one if May embraced a customs union. Corbyn has edged towards a Norway Plus agreement, inside the single market and a customs union, to the delight of those Labour and Tory backbenchers who insist there is a natural Commons majority for their “Common Market 2.0” Plan. Pro-EU cabinet ministers would also welcome this and think May might end up there as a last resort, but for now, she remains wedded to her deal. Corbyn has weakened May’s hand in Brussels, which likes his plan.
Ironically, Corbyn’s intervention might also help the prime minister win Tory votes. He has made it easier for her to present the choice to her Tory critics as: back my deal, or the Commons will approve a soft Brexit with Labour’s support. Indeed, I’m told she was already planning to make this very move. As one cabinet minister put it: “She doesn’t want a customs union, but she is preparing to threaten one.” This could push some Tory opponents into holding their nose and voting for her agreement.
It’s hardly a great sales pitch: vote for my imperfect deal or get something much worse. But, aided by a nod and a wink from Corbyn to Labour backbenchers, it might just work.
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/brexit-theresa-may-corbyn-deal-parliament-commons-vote-eu-negotiations-a8769066.html
Donald Tusk is an unlikely hero but after his latest intervention he’s become one of mine.
In case you’ve been hiding under a rock, Tusk yesterday publicly wondered “what that special place in **** looks like, for those who promoted Brexit, without even a sketch of a plan how to carry it out safely”.
For his sins, people like Theresa May’s deputy dog David Lidington have been falling over themselves to attack the European Council president for indulging in undiplomatic language. His party’s Brexiteer yobbos have gone further still. They’ve been busily blowing fuses. It’s a wonder we haven’t seen a heart attack or two.
That the Brexiteers, the Conservative Brexit Party, and the Labour Softer Brexit Party, still don’t have a clue and continue to talk to themselves while gazing at their navels and dreaming up more unicorns than you’ll find at a Comic Con convention in an attempt to conceal that the inconvenient truth is just an undiplomatic fact.
The Commons should be sitting until midnight, not mid-afternoon
The only shocking thing about what Tusk said is it’s taken this long for someone of real consequence to say it.
It wasn’t just for that reason that Tusk had me cheering him on, however. He also raised something else that May, her Philip K **** dystopia of a cabinet, and the rabid rent-a-gobs behind her, also consistently ignore.
Here’s some more undiplomatic language for them: those who criticised him for saying that are talking utter b******s. All of them.
There are lots of us in this country, millions in fact, who believe we should get a vote before they recreate the economy that existed immediately after the Wall Street Crash, destroy the NHS, trash any hope of a decent future for our children, risk the lives of people on long-term medication and empty the shelves of our supermarkets.
There are lots of us that want to remain in the EU, who manage to combine being European and British without too much fuss, and have been looking on in horror at what’s been happening.
Tusk recognising that fact in his press conference was welcome because we’ve largely been airbrushed out of the British political discourse by people who would strip our European identity from us.
In so doing he brutally exposed the failure of Britain’s opposition parties to provide an effective opposition to a suicidal project and to stand up to the xenophobes and f***wits that are driving it and have had it almost all their own way since this whole thing got started.
Small wonder that there’s been so much squealing in response.
The sad fact is that we know what Tusk’s special place in **** will look like. It will be the Britain the Brexiteers are creating, a tolerably successful nation tripping over its extremists’ pants and getting its nose rubbed in the dirt.It’d be nice if Tusk’s intervention instilled a bit of fire into someone beyond the usual suspects because we’re now perilously close to the iceberg. Unfortunately, there’s been scant sign of it happening.
Tusk famously used to be a football hooligan. The problem Britain faces is its thugs aren’t just in the stands. They’re on the pitch refereeing the game, looking on with sightless eyes as the best players get their legs broken.
Faced with that, isn’t it better to go down fighting than to cry regretful tears after the event?
Thin-skinned Brexiteers can’t handle a bit of salty language from Tusk
This is more widely known outside the circle of the Osama bin Brexit fantasists beloved of the BBC than you might think. It’s just that they’re too scared to give voice to it, so most of them mutter under their breath and do what their limp leaderships tell them to do.
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/donald-tusk-brexit-comments-brexiteers-theresa-may-rees-mogg-boris-johnson-a8767906.html
'Leave' voters are willing to give up access to the EU market to stop immigration
The UKIP fella was pretty typical.
Watch the next one,
Posting extreme ukip leave voters videos doesnt tell the story of the majority of that camp , as you well know .