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


blandy

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42 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

 

I’m not sure what the point of quoting that tweet is, HV. She’s a Tory, sure, but she’s echoing what you have said. Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas, or as you put it “why would you have a vote of confidence you're sure you're going to lose”. In the face of that, and recognising where there is both Labour Party membership and national support as well as a number of Tory, SNP and others supplying parliament as well as much of Labour, why not do what she says? She’s, as a Tory, saying she’d support Labour if they did. It’s extraordinary times, isn’t it?

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I'm not sure which version of Brexit Anna Soubry is supposed to be guilty of delivering, she's been pretty consistently voting against it with Grieve, unlike Elmer Fudd who only voted against it when she was out of the cabinet but jumped at the chance of a cabinet position and immediately become all Brexity again

This whole Anna Soubry is still a Tory thing is decidedly silly, she never claimed to be anything else but it's being said to put her down by Corbynistas opposed to Brexit. Absolute madness when a Tory MP gets targetted by Labour for having the temerity to oppose official (Tory) government policy, she's offering more opposition to the Tories on Brexit than the official opposition, maybe they are embarrassed at themselves

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1 hour ago, blandy said:

I’m not sure what the point of quoting that tweet is, HV. She’s a Tory, sure, but she’s echoing what you have said. Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas, or as you put it “why would you have a vote of confidence you're sure you're going to lose”. In the face of that, and recognising where there is both Labour Party membership and national support as well as a number of Tory, SNP and others supplying parliament as well as much of Labour, why not do what she says? She’s, as a Tory, saying she’d support Labour if they did. It’s extraordinary times, isn’t it?

How does she intend Jeremy Corbyn to 'get on with delivering a People's Vote', when he isn't the government, and no Conservatives have any intention of moving him into a position to do so, accidentally or otherwise?

It's fine, she's a Tory; I wouldn't expect anything else in a no-confidence vote. But there (almost certainly) won't be a 'People's Vote' while May remains in Number 10, so whatever Soubry says on the topic is simply jaw-jaw. She is enabling May's Brexit, by explicitly backing May. 

In general, I think the second referendum chances are greatly over-rated. I really don't think there's anything like a majority in the Commons to have another referendum, and I don't think all it's going to take to change that is her losing the meaningful vote. Certainly it will be easier for Labour MP's in leave-voting constituencies to vote against a second referendum than it would be to vote against a general election. 

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28 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Certainly it will be easier for Labour MP's in leave-voting constituencies to vote against a second referendum than it would be to vote against a general election. 

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All the current indications are that these no longer exist, even for the Conservatives there are far far fewer than there once were. Yes, I know polls etc but...

Talking of Leave Voting (now-ex) Labour MPs, even Frank Field came out for a 2nd Referendum today

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4 minutes ago, bickster said:

All the current indications are that these no longer exist, even for the Conservatives there are far far fewer than there once were. Yes, I know polls etc but...

Talking of Leave Voting (now-ex) Labour MPs, even Frank Field came out for a 2nd Referendum today

I mean, I don't know what to tell you. The parliamentary Labour party is absolutely not united behind the idea of a second referendum, that's the bottom line. 

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31 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

How does she intend Jeremy Corbyn to 'get on with delivering a People's Vote', when he isn't the government, and no Conservatives have any intention of moving him into a position to do so, accidentally or otherwise?

I'm not sure she "intends" him to. I think, if I read it right she's of the view that Parliament (i.e. not this party or that party, but Parliament collectively) can (and needs to) wrestle "control" from the lunacy of May and the lunacy of the hard Brexit lot. She personally is a remainer, from a leave voting constituency and she believes (as do millions) that a referendum is needed as the least bad way out of the mess. She sees that as May isn dead set against a referendum, but Labour's conference recently specifically included it as a possibility and further than Labour members etc. are in favour, that Parliament in the shape of the MPs from various parties could rally behind the idea (the Labour conference idea) of adopting a referendum. Jeremy Corbyn can either go with that, with many of his party, or stick to his pro Brexit stance, despite all the evidence of the harm it will do. SHe's to an extent grasping for straws to prevent catastrophe, and I personally have little to no faith that Corbyn is remotely capable of changing from his current "let them tories eff it up and we can then miraculously gain power for the glorious revolution" (a sort of Boris Johnson approach - duck and dive spout bollox and wait till power lands in your lap).

I don't much like her, tbh. But she's one of the ones with actual principles about putting the good of the country first, so there's that she's got going for her.

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4 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

The parliamentary Labour party is absolutely not united behind the idea of a second referendum, that's the bottom line. 

You're right. They're not united behind anything. Nor are the tories. It's got to stop being party based.It's beyond that. Someone somewhere needs to show non-partisan leadership, or at least independent of party whip leadership. It's unlikely to be a party leader, as they're so utterly dreadful. But someone needs to break cover.

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1 minute ago, blandy said:

I'm not sure she "intends" him to. I think, if I read it right she's of the view that Parliament (i.e. not this party or that party, but Parliament collectively) can (and needs to) wrestle "control" from the lunacy of May and the lunacy of the hard Brexit lot.

Sure. It's just that she's against any of the actual methods by which that could be achieved, other than 'hoping May has a Damascene conversion'. She's not a 'Tory rebel', despite being constantly introduced as such. 

2 minutes ago, blandy said:

Jeremy Corbyn can either go with that, with many of his party, or stick to his pro Brexit stance, despite all the evidence of the harm it will do.

Like, what actual difference is it supposed to make, whether a second referendum is official Labour party policy or not? The purpose of encouraging Labour to choose to make it official policy is to split the parliamentary Labour party; as I said before, I would expect nothing else. That's absolutely fine, and Labour would be doing likewise. But let's not pretend that this is a high-minded attempt to stop Brexit. 

There are real, hard choices for politicians to make these days. Anna Soubry could announce that she would back a no-confidence vote; if she did so, it might work to stop or lessen Brexit, but it might not, and she would never be elected again. Or she can state, as she effectively has this morning, that keeping Jeremy Corbyn out of number 10 is more important than stopping or lessening the impact of Brexit, which allows her to continue to be a Tory MP but effectively admits that Brexit is happening, and might not keep Corbyn out forever anyway. It's a tough choice, but it's a real choice, and we need to stop pretending that she is doing something else. 

9 minutes ago, blandy said:

SHe's to an extent grasping for straws to prevent catastrophe

As above, she isn't; she's making a choice about being a Tory first or a Remainer first. 

6 minutes ago, blandy said:

You're right. They're not united behind anything. Nor are the tories. It's got to stop being party based.It's beyond that. Someone somewhere needs to show non-partisan leadership, or at least independent of party whip leadership. It's unlikely to be a party leader, as they're so utterly dreadful. But someone needs to break cover.

There is no leader over the sea, waiting to grasp the mantle of anything. Theresa May sets the timetable, unless there's a vote of no confidence, which this morning proved there won't be before she loses the 'meaningful vote'; she dictates what happens. If the nation doesn't like it, they shouldn't have voted for so many Tory MP's in 2017. 

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51 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

How does she intend Jeremy Corbyn to 'get on with delivering a People's Vote', when he isn't the government, and no Conservatives have any intention of moving him into a position to do so, accidentally or otherwise?

Will Hutton was on the radio this morning, saying that Labour should have called a VOC.  In response to the point that it would lose, he replied that they should have brought about a situation where some tories would have voted against the government.

Magical thinking of the first order.  Send that man a unicorn!

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14 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

I mean, I don't know what to tell you. The parliamentary Labour party is absolutely not united behind the idea of a second referendum, that's the bottom line. 

Should they not be united behind the party policy agreed at conference, that they should attempt to force a general election, and if that fails then they should be attempting to force a new referendum?

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17 minutes ago, blandy said:

You're right. They're not united behind anything. Nor are the tories. It's got to stop being party based.It's beyond that. Someone somewhere needs to show non-partisan leadership, or at least independent of party whip leadership. It's unlikely to be a party leader, as they're so utterly dreadful. But someone needs to break cover.

Ideally, I'd want that to be Starmer.  Potentially Lammy as he makes all the right noises but I don't know if he's got enough clout for it.

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11 minutes ago, ml1dch said:

Should they not be united behind the party policy agreed at conference, that they should attempt to force a general election, and if that fails then they should be attempting to force a new referendum?

Yes they should.  They also need to be seen to fall back on the second referendum only when other avenues have been exhausted.  However, a faction within the PLP wants to jump to that position immediately, either because they don't care about the very real problem of maintaining support in areas where lots of Labour supporters voted leave, or because they see it as a way of undermining the party's leadership, or both.

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