Raver50032 Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 So, what other threads are worth looking into during the Parliamentary hiatus and Brexit pause over Christmas? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StefanAVFC Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 They are such dickheads 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chindie Posted December 23, 2018 VT Supporter Share Posted December 23, 2018 Pharmaceutical companies the latest to have it revealed the government has NDA'd them when discussing Brexit and No Deal prep. They've not even been given documents - discussions held with info given orally or with hard documents they were only allowed to view, not take away or copy. Ridiculous. It seems only the government is allowed to scare people over a No Deal Brexit (and spend more than £2bn doing so I think I read). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OutByEaster? Posted December 28, 2018 Moderator Share Posted December 28, 2018 Frankie Boyle is a national treasure. I've tried to get rid of all the swearing - let me know if I missed any. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/dec/22/frankie-boyle-review-2018-forget-brexit?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other&fbclid=IwAR2FZRuof32ul2WgnxFbQNhO8oyqfNj7Eg7PBSP5STL4b6CCpqTvSrEnjZ4 Quote The Brexit endgame Domestically, the year was dominated by the Conservative party successfully externalising its bitter divisions on trade. They have never, in their whole history, not been fighting about trade: trade laws are to the Tory party what ownership of the Queen Vic is to EastEnders. Theresa May was always only a placeholder prime minister, something that would appear to make about as much sense as using a slice of Victoria sponge as a bookmark. At the time of going to press, she had survived a vote of no confidence from Tory MPs, and there was the general impression that European leaders had agreed to end freedom of movement just to stop her from visiting them. Throughout the year, Boris Johnson has maintained that dishevelled, confused look of the people at the end of a disaster movie being ferried to the ambulances. He resigned as foreign secretary in July, barking “Chequers is dead” as if he were in an Agatha Christie novel and had just discovered the body of the butler at the bottom of the stairs. Johnson has promised a bonfire of EU regulations, a teetering one, without fencing and namby-pamby safety glasses, so that we can wipe the drifting cinders from our newly liberated eyes screaming, “F*** you, Brussels! Maybe I want to be blind!” I look forward to a UK without EU red tape, and vegans weeping in supermarkets that resemble a cross between a botanical freak show and a fruit-and-veg hospice. I say, let’s forget the worries of Brexit for a week or two, and just enjoy our last Christmas with running water. Brexit has many downsides, but I think it will be nice for the Irish to watch a British famine. Personally I look forward to a new age where the London Christmas lights won’t be turned on by vacuous celebrities, but by someone found guilty of “talking foreign” and sentenced to complete the circuit. A time where we no longer guess the fluctuations of the market, but our high priests stare into polished heads, newly bald from radiation sickness, and interpret the patterns cast by the light of flickering sewer-fat candles. Paradoxically, I think Brexit will actually lead to less nationalism: economic collapse meaning that borders lose all their current toxicity, as they’re constantly redrawn in a never-ending struggle between regional warlords, antibiotic-resistant microbes and organ-harvesting cyborgs. Our children will have less inclination to dwell on skin colour as they’ll be preoccupied with appeasing the whims of some pitiless, scab-encrusted Cyclops waving a horse’s hoof nailed to a broomstick, roaring for fresh meat as he plays his three-note national anthem on a ribcage xylophone. It is at times like those that we will remember the work of Dominic Raab, who resigned in November, having decided that he could not endorse a deal that he himself had negotiated. Raab didn’t want to be Brexit secretary, but he didn’t have the negotiating skills to decline the job. When Raab took over, I was heartened by the thought that negotiations were being handled by someone with the air of an embattled leisure centre manager, who could be outmanoeuvred by a statue of Stephen Hawking. Surely better withdrawal terms have been negotiated during prison sex. Much of the Brexit discourse has revolved around people who seem inbred telling us that diversity is bad, but there don’t seem to be any easy solutions. In a way, I envy the touching optimism of people who feel that another referendum might clear up all this bad feeling once and for all. The Labour party somehow managed to achieve a Brexit position more incoherent than a government of opportunists at war with itself. There is definitely something odd about Labour supporting free movement for goods and not, well, labour. Meanwhile, May tried to attack Jeremy Corbyn’s handling of antisemitism while in the middle of the Windrush scandal,which was like Pol Pot complaining about gender balance in the films of Martin Scorsese. Corbyn has mastered a lot of things, but strangely not saying s**t just to get elected. Mate, say some s**t just to get elected: it’s really your only job right now. This needs to go to the top of your to-do list, not somewhere down below “fix the spare room door”. And yet, he has undoubtedly been travestied by a press who must somehow contrive to terrify Middle England with a man who looks as if he celebrates New Year’s Eve by edging the lawn. Corbyn was attacked in August after the Daily Mail printed pictures of him laying a wreath for some Palestinian martyrs. Corbyn argued that, just because he was near the graves of terrorists, didn’t mean he was honouring terrorists. Personally, I’m surprised our politicians find the time to lay so many wreaths when not one of them has poured liquor on the ground for Tupac. Perhaps some idea of how Britain intends to deal with the post-Brexit world is encapsulated in the Dickensian figure of the secretary of state for international trade, Dr Liam Fox, a man for whom Another Day, Another Dollar means the proposed minimum wage in our trade agreement with the US. You might wonder how a former doctor can cheerfully promote arms sales. Luckily, Liam’s brain has plenty of experience hosting seemingly irreconcilable contradictions: such as believing we should all stand on our own two feet, while claiming expenses of three pence for a 100-metre car journey in 2012. Liam Fox manages to be a grotesque moral nihilist and yet, somehow, not even the worst Dr Fox. Like me, he was raised on an Irish Catholic council estate in Scotland. It’s these sliding-doors moments where I have to thank alcoholism for denying me the focus to become a genocidal sociopath. Yet perhaps the clearest signpost to post-Brexit Britain this year lay in Boris Johnson, and later Prince Andrew, advocating the procurement of a new Royal Yacht. Andrew said that, for British exports, it would be a tool in the bag – despite having never used a tool, or carried a bag. There is no doubt that having Prince Andrew on such a boat could boost Britain’s reputation, provided it never docks. Of course it’s hardly the first ship the royals have had: that burned up entering the atmosphere after their journey here from their home planet, Azeroth 9. But how do you respond to the monarchy asking for a £100m boat? The history of European royalty suggests they’re going to be well ahead of any suggestion to “go f**k themselves”. On balance, I say stick with the royal train: we can always add an international dimension just by extending the tracks into the sea. I've quoted the Brexit bit - but the rest of the article is well worth a read. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted December 28, 2018 Share Posted December 28, 2018 Boyle should stick to making jokes about handicapped children and leave the politics to Danny Dyer 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seat68 Posted December 28, 2018 Share Posted December 28, 2018 Danny Dyer being held up as a paragon (not by you Tony, I believe and hope it was sarcasm) basically for saying I voted leave because I was an idiot that allowed the daily mail to tell me what to do. Now I want to blame someone else for my idiocy. I understand people had their reasons for Leaving. Own them, dont blame someone that has gone and had the referendum because idiots pressured him into it. I dislike Danny Dyer. Prick. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StefanAVFC Posted December 28, 2018 Share Posted December 28, 2018 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post coda Posted December 28, 2018 Popular Post Share Posted December 28, 2018 And some said there'd be no benefits 9 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted December 28, 2018 Share Posted December 28, 2018 If 77% found the application easy or fairly easy to complete, that's 23% who didn't find it even fairly easy. The parliamentary written statement does say: Quote We have also learned lessons from this second private beta phase which have enabled further improvements to be made. These include improved functionality in respect of how an applicant verifies their email address; an increase in the size of files an applicant can upload, should they need to provide supporting evidence; and updates to the caseworking system. Those are going to have to be significant further improvements, though, surely if the caseworkers aren't going to get clogged up dealing with identity documents submitted by post (up to 10% of the applicants in the second beta phase of testing). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheAuthority Posted December 28, 2018 VT Supporter Share Posted December 28, 2018 I can't believe Parliament has just shut down and gone on Christmas holidays for a couple of weeks with Brexit looming. Just like the clearings in the woods over here have shut the government down over here and just buggered off. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LondonLax Posted December 28, 2018 Share Posted December 28, 2018 18 hours ago, OutByEaster? said: Raab didn’t want to be Brexit secretary, but he didn’t have the negotiating skills to decline the job. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted December 28, 2018 Share Posted December 28, 2018 9 hours ago, StefanAVFC said: Sky News: Quote A dozen smiling people featured in a Brexit advert by the government have been revealed as models posing for a stock photo. The video - released by the Home Office on Twitter - told EU citizens what they needed to do to stay in the UK after Brexit. It gave them details of the "settled status scheme", the new way those from the continent already living in Britain will be categorised for immigration purposes. Families, workers and groups of young friends were used to illustrate the video. But one Twitter user identified the pictures as stock photos - generic images created for use by the media and advertisers - and accused the government of using actors because it was "too ashamed of what you were doing to ask people to pose for them". Known simply as "The Irish Border", the social media user accused the Home Office of "boasting about an empty win with empty images", adding: "This is pure Brexit." ...more on link 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StefanAVFC Posted December 29, 2018 Share Posted December 29, 2018 There's a tweet for everything with key Leaver campaigners... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
villa4europe Posted December 29, 2018 Share Posted December 29, 2018 Surprised it isn't creating more outrage, it's an absolute disgrace, another example of how we were lied to during the vote and no doubt going to be turned in to a 2 way street by the EU 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wazzap24 Posted December 30, 2018 Share Posted December 30, 2018 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-46714984 Quote Concerns have been raised over the readiness of a British firm contracted by the government to run extra ferries in the event of a no-deal Brexit. Seaborne Freight was awarded a £13.8m contract this week to run a freight service between Ramsgate and Ostend. The firm has never run a ferry service and a local councillor said it would be impossible to launch before Brexit. Genius. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted December 30, 2018 Share Posted December 30, 2018 51 minutes ago, wazzap24 said: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-46714984 Genius. They are one of 3 firms at its an investment in a UK startup company. They have a small share as the other 2 providers are well established (European) companies. Not really a problem as the 2 other suppliers are ready to go. The silliest bit is UK investing tens of millions into European businesses to protect us from no deal Brexit chaos but I guess we don’t have a home made company who can do it (yet hence the investment in the startup). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted December 30, 2018 Share Posted December 30, 2018 (edited) 32 minutes ago, Genie said: They are one of 3 firms at its an investment in a UK startup company. They have a small share as the other 2 providers are well established (European) companies. Not really a problem as the 2 other suppliers are ready to go. The contract award to Seabourne Freight UK Ltd is £13.8m for a service between England & Belgium (Ramsgate to Ostend). There have been two other separate contracts awarded to DFDS (€47m) and Bretagne Angleterre Irlande (£47m) for other routes. Edit: These are all different enterprises, aren't they? Edited December 30, 2018 by snowychap Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted December 30, 2018 Share Posted December 30, 2018 (edited) 50 minutes ago, snowychap said: The contract award to Seabourne Freight UK Ltd is £13.8m for a service between England & Belgium (Ramsgate to Ostend). There have been two other separate contracts awarded to DFDS (€47m) and Bretagne Angleterre Irlande (£47m) for other routes. Edit: These are all different enterprises, aren't they? Yes, which is what I said isn’t it? The British startup business was awarded a share of the business alongside 2 established companies. They are all doing the same job. Edited December 30, 2018 by Genie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted December 30, 2018 Share Posted December 30, 2018 15 minutes ago, Genie said: Yes, which is what I said isn’t it? I'm trying to clarify what you meant when you said there were three firms, that Seabourne 'had a small share' and that they have been awarded a small share of the business alongside two established companies. They have been awarded 100% of the contract to provide services between England and Belgium, haven't they? 33 minutes ago, Genie said: They are all doing the same job. Three different companies have been awarded three different contracts for three different amounts to provide freight services in three different areas (Eng -> Bel; Eng -> Fra; Eng -> Ger/ Eng-> NL) from what I can see. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wazzap24 Posted December 30, 2018 Share Posted December 30, 2018 3 hours ago, Genie said: They are one of 3 firms at its an investment in a UK startup company. They have a small share as the other 2 providers are well established (European) companies. Not really a problem as the 2 other suppliers are ready to go. The silliest bit is UK investing tens of millions into European businesses to protect us from no deal Brexit chaos but I guess we don’t have a home made company who can do it (yet hence the investment in the startup). As @snowychap says, the start-up is providing exclusive freight services from Ramsgate to Ostend. Although it's the smaller of the 3 arrangements, they are solely responsible for this route. They may well have experienced people on board, but it smacks of another daft decision when they haven't even got any boats, staff, crew etc yet. I agree on the second point and it's made even worse by the fact they can't even waste money in the 'right' way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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