The now-enacted will of (some of) the people

[NurembergVillan]

I can only imagine the state of the Brexit whoppers sending out Christmas cards like this to MPs.

They're like gloating football fans after a victory rather than anything vaguely political.

This one - why Brexit Christmas and not Happy Brexit?

Nob heads. It's absolutely bizarre behaviour.

[Chindie]

You can guarantee it'll be more gammon faced clearings in the woods.

[StefanAVFC]

The irony of these f....wads calling anybody snowflakes when they get offended by MPs being sovereign.

Edited November 21, 2017 by blandy
swearing

[hippo]

15 hours ago, PompeyVillan said:

I like how our chaps are still pretending they're not going to be bent over a barrell on the settlement fee.

It stinks a bit to me, the EU are extorting money from the UK on the basis that they won't even negotiate a trade deal, that we need more than they do, before we've paid them off.

Makes this Brexit business seem a bit daft doesn't it? Perhaps we should have the chance to change our minds. There's never a bad time to reverse a poor decision. 

Couldn't agree more - all that bravado and now we appear to have taken a deal that was on the table pretty much from the off - having caved in that (not that we had an option) what are odds of a getting a trade deal that just about betters world trade tariffs.........remind me what this was a good idea again ? - 

[snowychap]

Let's hope The Grauniad have reported some of this wrongly:

Quote

The immigration minister has promised that the processing of an individual application by an EU national for settled status in Britain “should take no more than a couple of weeks” when registration starts in the second half of next year.

The minister, Brandon Lewis, told the Commons home affairs select committee that an extra 1,200 UK visas and immigration staff were being recruited to process an expected 3.5m applications from EU nationals over two and a half years.

He also told MPs on Tuesday that he was optimistic that an agreement could be struck by Christmas on the rights of EU citizens in the UK in the Brexit negotiations. However, he declined to comment on reports that the Brexit inner cabinet had decided on Monday that the European court of justice could continue to play a role in guaranteeing their rights during a two-year transition period.

The Home Office minister did confirm that those refused “settled status” and classed as non-EU nationals in Britain illegally could have their bank accounts frozen and face deportation before the hearing of any appeal in British courts.

The 3million group, representing EU nationals in Britain, immediately questioned Lewis’s claim that an agreement with the EU on “settled status” was likely before Christmas. “We wonder how. Major stumbling blocks still in place,” they tweeted, noting continued differences over the role of the ECJ, over family reunification rights that could affect thousands, and regarding clarification that they should not face “hostile environment measures”.

Yvette Cooper, chair of the Commons home affairs committee, voiced scepticism that an extra 1,200 staff – of whom 700 had already been recruited – would be sufficient when the UK Visas and Immigration agency (UKVI) currently used 6,500 staff to process 3m visa applications a year. There was already a three-month delay in processing EU nationals’ applications for permanent residence documents, she said.

The Home Office minister insisted, however, that the EU applications would be much more straightforward than the bulk of UKVI’s usual cases and would be dealt with by a new “simple and swift” system, with an online user portal similar to that used to renew driving licences.

Lewis said that EU “settled status” applicants, subject to the outcome of the negotiations, would have to verify their identity, pass a criminality check and establish five years’ residence in the UK. The Home Office would use existing HMRC tax/DWP national insurance databases to verify applications. Applicants would not have to submit their passports to prove residence.

The new system, which is being developed with groups of EU nationals, would be tested in the first half of next year and each application “should take a couple of weeks and not months” to process. Lewis said unlike other UKVI casework the system would be based on “a different cultural approach”, applicants being granted settled status.

He said, however, that non-EU nationals and others who tried to “game the system” could find themselves being rejected and facing deportation before their legal appeals could be heard in the courts.

The immigration minister was challenged by Cooper over the Home Office’s 10% error rate in revoking driving licences, and its refusal for new bank accounts for those wrongly identified as illegally in the country. He tried to reassure the MPs that when banks were required to do immigration checks on millions of existing bank accounts from January no one’s account would be frozen until a second check had been made with the Home Office.

The banks will be required to carry out an automated sweep of their accounts against a Home Office database of people who are in the UK illegally. But Lewis confirmed that it was possible that somebody wrongly identified as an illegal immigrant could find their bank account frozen for up to 12 months while they appealed through the courts.

 

[Enda]

18 hours ago, tonyh29 said:

Decided on the flip of a coin ....democracy at its best,

The member-states had two rounds of voting based on the merits of cities' proposals. Frankfurt was eliminated in the first round. Denmark abstained from the second round, leaving 26 votes to play for. Dublin got 13 votes and Paris got 13 votes, and so it was at that point they flipped a coin --- exactly as would happen in a UK general election.

[Xann]

Quote

Lawyers representing Molly and Jolyon Maugham of the Good Law Project have written again to David Davis and Philip Hammond giving them 14 days to release in full government studies into the economic impacts of Brexit. If they refuse to make the documents publicly available, they will start judicial review proceedings in the High Court.

The letter points to the fact that, following a Labour motion which pressed the government into agreeing to release the documents to a government committee, recent government statements ‘leaves it wholly uncertain what information will be made public, and when’.

Molly and Jolyon Maugham QC are demanding that 58 sectoral impact studies be released as well as a Treasury report comparing the predicted economic impacts of Brexit with potential benefits of alternative free trade agreements. They say the information must be made publicly available in its entirety without redaction. 

Molly Scott Cato - Green MEP

 

[snowychap]

15 minutes ago, Enda said:

The member-states had two rounds of voting based on the merits of cities' proposals. Frankfurt was eliminated in the first round. Denmark abstained from the second round, leaving 26 votes to play for. Dublin got 13 votes and Paris got 13 votes, and so it was at that point they flipped a coin --- exactly as would happen in a UK general election.

I think we draw straws.

[ml1dch]

6 minutes ago, snowychap said:

I think we draw straws.

I think Cameron and Johnson replaced that in the legislature with the biscuit game.

[peterms]

1 hour ago, snowychap said:

Let's hope The Grauniad have reported some of this wrongly:

 

It's an interesting idea that "gaming the system" should be punished by deportation.

I look forward to that general principle being rolled out to other aspects of our national life, such as

• MPs' expenses
• taxdodging
• legislating on private renting and housing benefit while being a private landlord

[snowychap]

21 hours ago, Chindie said:

Remember those European agencies, the EMA and EBA, that employ a few hundred people between them that David Davis told us wouldn't need to leave at Brexit?

They've going to Amsterdam and Paris respectively.

Have they been negotiating about these even though it was nowt to do with the negotiations?

[chrisp65]

Leader of the DUP currently on the news accusing europe of 'playing politics' with the Northern Ireland border. Then saying they were probably just opportunistically taking their moment in the sun.

The utter lack of an ironic nod or wink.

Couldn't make it up.

 

[tonyh29]

6 hours ago, Enda said:

The member-states had two rounds of voting based on the merits of cities' proposals. Frankfurt was eliminated in the first round. Denmark abstained from the second round, leaving 26 votes to play for. Dublin got 13 votes and Paris got 13 votes, and so it was at that point they flipped a coin --- exactly as would happen in a UK general election.

I’m well aware thanks ... was just trying to shoehorn in an obligatory DD joke 

[peterms]

 

[peterms]

 

[a m ole]

8 hours ago, peterms said:

 

this is what i don’t get about ‘No Deal’ arguments, as if the EU wouldn’t be able to work out that the UK is bluffing by pretending they would be happy to walk away with nothing. “Shhhh, don’t tell them!”

[peterms]

38 minutes ago, a m ole said:

this is what i don’t get about ‘No Deal’ arguments, as if the EU wouldn’t be able to work out that the UK is bluffing by pretending they would be happy to walk away with nothing. “Shhhh, don’t tell them!”

 

[peterms]

In an abrupt U-turn, the UK Government today announced that it would recognise the power of gravity for the purposes of Brexit negotiations.

"Our previous position had been that we would acknowledge gravity, but only to the degree that it applies on the Moon" said David Davis MP.

"Some of our colleagues thought that was too much.  John Redwood, for example, argued that we should not recognise gravity at all, so that we were free to float all over the place, doing pretty much as we wish.  He says he applies that principle in his personal life, and at night it's only the weight of the bedclothes that holds him down, otherwise he would be drifting round the bedroom like an emaciated airship".

"In fact, we have now agreed to recognise the full force of gravity, during and beyond the Brexit negotiations, and acknowledge that it applies not only to the UK, but to France, Germany, Italy, Spain and some other countries whose names escape me for the moment".

"I now expect our EU colleagues to recognise that this is a major and deeply significant concession, made in a spirit of good will to kick-start a faster negotiation process, and I look forward to them making similar concessions of at least the same magnitude".

[ml1dch]

2 hours ago, a m ole said:

this is what i don’t get about ‘No Deal’ arguments, as if the EU wouldn’t be able to work out that the UK is bluffing by pretending they would be happy to walk away with nothing. “Shhhh, don’t tell them!”

See also the mythical, secret sectoral impact reports.

"We can't release them, it might show the enemy how buggered we are"

"We can do our own research and see perfectly well how buggered you are thank you"

Edited November 22, 2017 by ml1dch

[darrenm]

21 minutes ago, ml1dch said:

See also the mythical, secret sectoral impact reports.

"We can't release them, it might show the enemy how buggered we are"

"We can do our own research and see perfectly well how buggered you are thank you"

Stop talking Britain down you lot. We wouldn't have won 2 wars with that attitude.