Re: Brexit
 

It solves everything. The problem isn’t a divided country, it’s a Government and Parliament trying to avoid blame.

Leave wins 2nd ref and all the criticisms of the first are invalid. People, without doubt, would be making an informed choice. Unicorn Brexit doesn’t exist.

Remain wins and all this becomes a damp squib.

Re: Brexit
 

Remain wins - especially by a margin similar to leave’s win in 2016 - and our fractured society becomes worse and trust in our political system hits rock bottom. Do you seriously think that a simple remain win in another referendum would make all this just go away?

(Which of course is to accept your assumption that a new referendum would be “Deal or remain”, something everyone is being careful not to talk about right now.)

Re: Brexit
 

Our society has been fractured since the 80s. Nothing new there. However our Establishment doesn’t view that as a problem, Brexit on the other hand is.

In the words of the Chancellor the talk is of a “confirmatory referendum”, that necessitates endorsing the decision to leave.

Re: Brexit
 

We were also leaving on 31/3 and not taking part in EU elections and Brexit meant Brexit, whatever that meant....

If the politicians can't decide, we have to. It'll be a while yet (slowly, slowly catchee monkey ;)) , but they'll have go back for another vote eventually. Politicians can then wash their hands if it. Hopefully this time people will know exactly what they're voting for. If they genuinely want to be worse off, fair enough.

Re: Brexit
 

I’m convinced the politicians have decided already. This is all stage managed. Everyone saying just the right thing at the right time.

Re: Brexit
 

A confirmatory referendum could equally be used to endorse the manner in which we leave, while respecting the 2016 result by not opening an avenue to overturn it.

That aside, I note you sidestepped my question with an oblique swipe at Margaret Thatcher, which really is a tired old cliche even on Clydeside these days.

Why should a remain victory in a 2019 referendum settle the issue when a leave victory in 2016 did not - especially as the result of that referendum was never implemented?

Re: Brexit
 

Blame the politicians for that scenario..

---------- Post added at 10:47 ---------- Previous post was at 10:44 ----------

Sorry but it would be exactly the same as the first referendum with constant lies and obfuscation from both sides with copious amounts of emnity thrown in for good measure.

Re: Brexit
 

It’s not a sidestep of the question. Society is fractured. People in working class towns and villages have literally nothing in common with the London financial bubble.

For many they have literally no investment in the success, or otherwise, of the wider economy because they won’t (or at least believe they won’t) see it.

The referendum won’t solve people’s problems either way, but it’ll solve politicians problems.

Re: Brexit
 

Yes but folks are more clued up now. If they don't know the real pro/cons of Brexit, they must have been on the Space Station.... The question might not necessarily be the same, it might be on different types of Brexit, or confirming whatever parliament decides.

Re: Brexit
 

Nail on head as I see it :tu:

Maybe that would change though if half of the 'financial sector' down south suddenly uprooted and moved to Slovenia (with the aid of EU grants) and left people with bugger all . . .


. . . oh hang on, that's what they're worried about isn't it :D

Re: Brexit
 

A political choice was taken to make us a country that dealt with services and not manufacturing. The problem being services can be highly concentrated in small booming areas.

This wasn’t the fault of the EU. Successive governments of both colours did little to resolve it just parking people on benefits until they got to pension age. It was only sustainable during the boom. Now it’s not. Austerity has hit the exact same communities again.

We digress... but at least there’s some agreement!

Re: Brexit
 

The people you seem so concerned about are the same ones who carried the Leave victory in 2016, whereas the ones who have never given up wailing about Brexit are the ones who live in a bubble where cheap wine and long weekends on the continent are perceived to be at risk.

Granted here in Scotland the political dynamic is somewhat different, but that’s because the natural Leave support base in the central belt is still in thrall to the SNP, which is still clinging to the bizarre, contradictory ideas that Brexit will be a disaster for Scotland whilst Scexit would somehow bring about nirvana.

Regardless, a second referendum campaign would solve nothing. In the event of a further Leave victory we would have all the same accusations of lies and misrepresentation as we have had since 2016. The problem has never been a faulty or illegitimate campaign in 2016; the problem has only and ever been the disconnect between our overwhelmingly Remain political class (and the commentariat that hangs on its coat tails), and the clear majority of the population which is for Leave, most especially in those parts of the country that don’t get to experience the prosperity they are assured the EU has brought about.

Re: Brexit
 

Only if they lied and misrepresented (and illegally funded) again.

Re: Brexit
 

Will you stop going on about a second referendum, I am sure you keep bringing it up, just to piss off the other side - pack it in - there is not the numbers for it in HoC and it has been defeated 3 times already - be told. :rolleyes:

Re: Brexit
 

And yet it's on the agenda for the ongoing Tory/Labour Brexit talks. Think it will be a last option, but they'll come back to it eventually.

Re: Brexit
 

Mick, as you know, the House of Commons can peg he same amendment onto any new proposals. The numbers can, and do often, change. You seem to be confusing matters because it’s not your preferred outcome.

As with leaving on March 29th, things can (and do) change. Until we actually agree and leave the EU the prospect of a second referendum will continue to loom over the process.

Re: Brexit
 

It’s on the agenda because it was a precondition for Jezza to talk to Tess, and Jezza has to be seen talking to Tess if Tess is to stand any chance of getting a longer extension from the EU. If nothing changes, no further extension will be allowed.

A second referendum is politically toxic. A majority of MPs understand that, even if their leaders have to pretend not to in order to excuse their discussions.

Re: Brexit
 

Amazes me how a second referendum is still touted as a possibility yet leaving with no deal isn't :shrug:

I'm probably wrong, but I always thought leaving with no deal was the default position if we had no deal . . . which we haven't . . . but still not left :rolleyes:

The way it's going, the EU will be assimilated into the Great Pacific Corporation (which doesn't exist yet) before we actually get anywhere :D

Re: Brexit
 

Do “a majority” understand that? One of the times it was voted against Labour whipped against. Hardly representative of their own opinion.

---------- Post added at 12:36 ---------- Previous post was at 12:34 ----------

That’s an easy one, we’ve got Parliament trying to sabotage the process because it favours remain (we all agree on this point).

No deal guarantees we do not remain.

2nd referendum is probably 50/50 on the outcome.

Re: Brexit
 

Not leaving on 29/3 was politically toxic, yet it happened.
Everything is in play now, apart from No Deal, which was a threat that nobody meant.

Re: Brexit
 

Does that mean you did believe Dave Cameron and what he told you and didn't believe what mogg Johnson gove Davis farage and large sections of the media told you or not?

Thought we had a discussion the other day on my thoughts on Obama involving himself in our affairs, just in case I wasn't clear I strongly disapproved of it, much in the same way I dissaprove of two wrongs making a right 're the referendum campaigns, if they're part of the democracy we must uphold at all costs then you can keep it., it's not worth fighting for.

Re: Brexit
 

I did not follow anything what any politician said, I have made myself clear loads of times - I have wanted to leave the EU for a very very long time, more than 10 years, it is a vast, ever growing corrupted entity that wants more power and eventually steer towards a United States of Europe, no thank you.

We already has the denials there was not going to be a EU Army, but there will be. The EU is just going to get worse and worse when it comes to power - they are already inflicting misery with their Article 13 bullshit that was voted on and approved the other week, the young in the UK will like that one - not!

Re: Brexit
 

Blair is a UK citizen, the other two are American and not from the EU.

Re: Brexit
 

And just to go over the hypocrisy of the corrupted EU and Article 13 - Donald Tusk was going on about the Parliamentary petition with 6 million signatures on it saying they should be listened to, conveniently forgetting that 17.4 Million beats 6 million, well minus the multiple sigs on it, yet they (the EU) are quite happy to ignore this one:-

https://www.change.org/p/european-pa...e-the-internet

Bloody hypocrites. :rolleyes:

Re: Brexit
 

I wanted to leave then to, still would have if anyone could have come up with a decent argument, thatnotwithstanding I can't see how it's credible for you to say no one was influenced or duped by the liars and charlatans when you didn't follow anything they said.

Re: Brexit
 

I voted leave in the first referendum in 1975. In the years since then nothing happened to change my mind.

The EU is nothing else other than a slow conduit to globalism. It matters nothing to me as I'll most likely be gone by then but all those millenials (sorry, remainers) will be the ones who will rue the day democracy was overturned in the UK. They just cannot see it. It's been obvious as time went on.

That said, it is their life ahead of them not mine. I just take heart in the thought of them saying in the future-"If only we'd listened!".

I'll happily laugh in my existential state.;)

Re: Brexit
 

Come off it, Hugh. Leavers knew what they voted for. It's the remainers, full of self doubt, who were and are confused.

---------- Post added at 18:18 ---------- Previous post was at 18:13 ----------

Frankly, I'm hoping for an accidental Brexit. The antics of this bumbling Parliament will probably make this the ultimate outcome.

Then we can start striving for better things while continuing to trade with the EU.

Re: Brexit
 

People know my stance on polling but....

Well well well...

https://www.cableforum.uk/board/atta...1&d=1554484846

You Gov poll along similar lines too earlier this week.

Re: Brexit
 

Looks like May's deal is as popular as a rattlesnake in a lucky dip. :D

Re: Brexit
 

The problem is that we are living in a global economic and opting out of it is unlikely to be beneficial in future.

The alternative scenario is millennials (a generation which didn't causing a banking crisis they suffered from or accrue the debt they'll need to pay back) live though an era where the British economy and status in the world declines and they don't think 'they were right' of the generation that went before.

Re: Brexit
 

You’ve been right about polling all along ;)

I jest. It’s valid as a poll, with the usual caveats. If two polls show it then it’s nkt likely to be rogue.

Re: Brexit
 

If we are living in a global economic world, why are you suggesting we should be Eurocentric?

As for the millenials, they will make their own mistakes in time. I would also point out that the millenials did not all vote to remain, which is what you seem to be implying.

There is no point in trying to justify the unjustifiable by dividing people against each other. Leavers know why they voted leave and unlike most remainers, could see that we would be better off, yes, better off, than remaining in that rotting, undemocratic monstrocity they call the EU.

---------- Post added at 19:07 ---------- Previous post was at 19:05 ----------

Nice to see the remainers seem to be in terminal decline.

Re: Brexit
 

Could be better off.

Re: Brexit
 

BREAKING: France, Spain and Belgium 'ready for no-deal Brexit next week'
Chance of May getting 30 June extension appear slim after notes of EU meeting emerge.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics...P=share_btn_tw

Re: Brexit
 

Then it won't happen will it? But my point is that this is going to be tested now and if you are wrong then then millennials are unlikely to be thankful.

Re: Brexit
 

It's not as if May's request for a delay are in order to prepare for Brexit, it's to allow remain by whatever possible means.

Re: Brexit
 

They seemed to have missed off "No Brexit" as one of the options...

Must be because the narrative to that poll was Not really valid, is it, if you limit the choices?

https://www.televisor.co.uk/featured...it-news/040513

Re: Brexit
 

I saw this on Twitter:

So true. The Leave voters who were told that this is a big win for them have just got fed up waiting for the sunlit uplands or at least the promise of them.

Most of the "No Deal" advocates in the poll above are just wanting this farce to be over. Of course, when the pain arrives they will have other thoughts but hey, we live in an age of a Wish is a Fact so for the lemmings, the cliff awaits.

For the Leave voters who the political class and big business have ignored & exploited for decades, this vote was all about sticking, quite rightly, a middle finger up to the establishment. The pain of a No Deal was/will not be what they were/will expect and yet again, those that will truly suffer will be those who can afford it least.

The people who deserve the most criticism are those who sold Leave as a 100% positive outcome, lying through their teeth and now, when the proverbial is hitting the fan, they claim to have said No Deal was acceptable all along. Shame on them ...

Damien's point of the millenials is so valid: the Tories have sold their political birthright down the toilet. I give them 5 to 10 years at the most ..

Re: Brexit
 

No Brexit, i.e "Remain", lost that vote in 2016 Hugh - nice try though. :rolleyes:

Re: Brexit
 

I'm guessing here, but based on the above, your stance on polls is to promote those that don't have remain as an option?

Re: Brexit
 

No it is not valid.

They have done no such thing because project fear is exactly that - just fiction. We should have every right to prosper as a pure independent country, we do not need to be tied in to a corrupted union that wants to seek more power from it's members. :rolleyes:

I wasn't old enough to vote in various elections - it happens, you don't run the same vote just because people become of age.

My future was chosen for me, it happens!!! :rolleyes:

Re: Brexit
 

Sound analysis. A no-deal Brexit could well be the end of the Conservative Party. Maybe we need to go through such a period of suffering, get a fairer voting system and eventually return to the EU with more political parties representing all shades of opinion.

Re: Brexit
 

FFS - I didn't do the damn poll - wind your necks in. :mad:

Re: Brexit
 

As I’ve suspected, no one member state wants to take the blame for a No Deal Brexit, and no number of small member states could afford to pyss off Germany by forcing it. Only France, with moral support from at least one other significant member, could get away with it.

I really don’t know what May is thinking asking for basically the same extension date she asked for - and was denied - less than two weeks ago. She can only imagine she has some way of convincing the 27 that there’s sufficient progress to justify it. The problem with that is that simply meeting Jezza and then promising more votes in the Commons isn’t going to prove progress.

---------- Post added at 20:07 ---------- Previous post was at 20:03 ----------

Also ... Sky and Yougov polls this week have both shown sufficient support for a No Deal Brexit that if it comes to it, the Tory party need not consider allowing it to be electoral suicide.

Re: Brexit
 

It won't be what the polls say but what happens after that would be electoral suicide. Unless No Deal turns out to the be fine it will be this government and those pushing No Deal held responsible for it.

Re: Brexit
 

We are paying £1bn a month into their budget. They need us more than we need them!

Re: Brexit
 

You could do worse than to read Katya Adler on the BBC News website. Now that No Deal is staring them down the throat, the unity is starting to crumble (just slightly). What it will come down to is a calculation between which member states will lose most out of a No Deal (Germany) and which stands to gain from acting tough and booting us out (France, i.e. Macron).

You and I both know that the UK Parliament is basically unable and unwilling to draw a line under this. You think that means we’re in for a referendum; I think it is reasonably likely that France in consort with at least one other member state will draw a line under it for us. The French have always known we’d be a spanner in le works. They were right, and should never have undone De Gaulle’s good work in denying us membership in the first place. Maybe now they’ll take the chance to right a historic wrong and veto an extension just as De Gaulle once vetoed our membership.

Re: Brexit
 

I was out at “staring them down the throat”. The exact wasteful terminology that has left us here at all.

Re: Brexit
 

Stick your fingers in your ears and sing la la la :)

Re: Brexit
 

You should during the perpetual extension for health and safety.

Re: Brexit
 

Theresa May extending Article 50

https://www.cableforum.uk/images/local/2019/04/2.gif

Re: Brexit
 

Every little helps.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-47833702

Re: Brexit
 

When we remain i’ll quote this post.

Re: Brexit
 

phew, got mine just in time, then...

Re: Brexit
 

Re: Brexit
 

With all of this talk of potentially having to participate in the upcoming European Parliamentary elections - can I just say that it’s bad enough being ruled by unelected bloody Eurocrats, without having to bloody vote for them!

Re: Brexit
 

The Cabinet Office are hiring for the role of Policy adviser - electoral campaigning and referendums - https://cabinetofficejobs.tal.net/vx...erendums/en-GB

What can that be for I wonder?

Re: Brexit
 

The Cabinet Office was asked last week to commence contingency planning for our possible involvement in the Euro elections in May.

Re: Brexit
 

European Parliament huh it's full of foreigners ;)

Re: Brexit
 

Re: Brexit
 

You forgot "perfidious"...

Re: Brexit
 

:) Yes it's a real double whammy !

Re: Brexit
 

Don’t worry, the powers of the pretend parliament are somewhat limited and as there are no pan-European parties they rarely produce a coherent policy about anything. The European Commission is where all the serious directives are born, and it is a reassuringly unelected institution that is quite impossible for any voter anywhere in Europe to dismiss from office. You may be reassured that if we do have to go to the polls on 23 May that your vote will have token value for approximately 72 hours, after which we can all forget our new MEPs exist, as per the norm.

Re: Brexit
 

Does the Commission self approve these directives or is there another mechanism for approving the directives they propose?

Re: Brexit
 

Nice try - but from your question it sounds like you don’t understand how the proposal, revision and acceptance of EU law actually works.

The Commission proposes and develops legislation. The Parliament must be consulted and may propose amendments (which the Commission does not have to accept). The Parliament must consent to the final formulation and may withhold that consent (but in practice, does not), and the Council of Ministers takes the final decision on whether to enact. In the Council, we have one elected representative out of 28 and an ever-shrinking number of areas in which they can exercise a veto.

That’s the process which I’m pretty sure you didn’t previously understand ... no need to thank me.

And I stand by my claim that the pretend parliament is more or less an irrelevance in the overall process.

Re: Brexit
 

And the reason most stuff gets passed is that it’s done by consensus, discussing and agreeing things first, rather than the adversarial system we have that leads to the farrago we have with Brexit.

Re: Brexit
 

Re: Brexit
 

No, but I will. Not a lot of people seem to appreciate that the EU is really not democratic at all.

The only way to have any influence at all is to elect disruptive MEPs. If we end up having to participate in more EU elections, all leavers should vote UKIP. Maybe that will get the message across, and there would be no adverse implications as there would be if we elected UKIP MPs.

---------- Post added at 18:58 ---------- Previous post was at 18:55 ----------

It would look a lot worse than that if you took off your rose-tinted spectacles, Hugh.

I mean - democratic? No way. No more so than in a Communist society, where elections mean nowt.

Re: Brexit
 

The Brexit Party would be better than UKIP and send a clearer message. Provided there is a candidate in their constituency.

Re: Brexit
 

Ok, so the democratically elected parliament and council do get to approve directives from the commission and do get to send back directives to the commission and our Council representation has an effect. All good then!

Re: Brexit
 

Re: Brexit
 

Yup, winner of the most patronising post of the year so far. :) Your obvious bias invalidates any attempt at objective analysis.

Re: Brexit
 

Only come across as patronising as he’s trying to educate a blissfully ignorant person.

Re: Brexit
 

Re: Brexit
 

Majority of the public want a second referendum.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...-a8857211.html

Re: Brexit
 

To call someone who someone deluded just because they don't agree with you is a somewhat absolutist position.

So cultural differences negate the fact that the representatives that were elected by the population and is therefore undemocratic? What level of cultural, political of historical granularity is democratic? Is, for example, Belgium as a nation democratic when there are clear historical and cultural differences between Wallonia and Flanders? How about Germany that was federalised in 1871? How about the UK in 1707? in Does devolution in the UK make this country more or less democratic?

On ganging up, does the party political system in any governmental system result in the same thing? Do we vote for a representative or a party? If we vote for a party, then 'ganging up' occurs in any system.

In terms of the council, the heads of state are democratically and directly elected in France, Poland, Austria, Ireland, Finland, Portugal, Czech Republic, Romania, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Slovania, Lithuania and Cyprus. The heads of state for Germany and Italy are voted by their relevant Parliaments. It's a pretty good sample to be fair. To say the Council is undemocratic because of how nations appoint their heads of state states that systems where the head of state is appointed are equally undemocratic and this would include the UK

---------- Post added at 21:32 ---------- Previous post was at 21:29 ----------

Just asking a question about a perception of how the EU works as it was a surprise to me that the Commission did things that go against how I understand in terms of the relationship between the Commission, Parliament and Council

Re: Brexit
 

Re: Brexit
 

We seem to be re-fighting the 2016 campaign ... again ... which is more than a little tiresome.

A sovereign independent nation decides its laws via electoral processes and representatives within its borders. It does not have legislation forced upon it by supranational institutions, and the fig leaf of democracy which we are graciously allowed to have a small share in is no recompense. For me, that really is the beginning and the end of the Brexit debate. Whatever the supposed benefits of EU membership, the cost is far too high.

---------- Post added at 22:06 ---------- Previous post was at 21:58 ----------

Not cultural differences, no. There are cultural differences between the nations of the UK and even within the nations.

The question within the UK and across Europe is whether or not there is a single demos - a single political consciousness. Within the UK, there is. A general election campaign is visibly similar in Glasgow and in London, even despite regional differences such as the SNP, which for all its pretensions is a very British political party that operates in just the same way as, for example, Labour. Spend a few minutes watching First Minister’s Questions in Holyrood and you are left in no doubt that you’re observing exactly the same political culture as Westminster, no matter how much they might hate to admit it.

There is an identifiable British political consciousness which allows political parties to operate across the country (with the notable exception of Northern Ireland) that is not replicated at the EU level. There are no pan-EU parties; there will be no pan-EU manifestos or coordinated campaigns this May. There is no coherent programme for governance that we can vote for, and which electors in Cologne, Cardiff and Caen may understand and judge in the same way.

That is why the British Parliament is a legitimate democratic institution, fit to legislate for the whole British population, and the European Parliament is not.

Re: Brexit
 

1500 of those surveyed is not a majority of anything.

All these polls show is that they don't work for something very complex, that said, only one poll matters, the one taken in 2016 that said the UK wants to leave the EU, so lets get on with leaving.

Re: Brexit
 

The House of Commons does not have to be dictated as to what it can legislate by Civil Servants.

You need to take your blindfolds off. The EU is not a democracy. Not in any sense of the word.

Why are so many people, including you, are blind to this?

Re: Brexit
 

The poll is a simple choice of yes or no, I fail to see the complexity.

Re: Brexit
 

Ah, if only it was sarcasm ..

---------- Post added at 23:11 ---------- Previous post was at 23:08 ----------

Jon is more informed on this subject than most. Your assumption of his ignorance betrays an unwillingness to listen.

---------- Post added at 23:13 ---------- Previous post was at 23:11 ----------

Some comparisons to add to the debate;

https://www.cableforum.uk/images/local/2019/04/1.jpg

Re: Brexit
 

Amazing what you can do with deliberate choice of wording isn’t it.

Re: Brexit
 

The last few posts would seem to counter that assertion.

Re: Brexit
 

From Geoffrey Cox, the (very) Pro-Brexit Attorney General yesterday

Re: Brexit
 

Jon can only be held responsible for his own posts, not the last few posts. ;)

---------- Post added at 10:26 ---------- Previous post was at 10:22 ----------

Penny's starting to drop as strong pro-Brexiters realise that no-deal is not an option at the moment and their skins have been saved by Parliament.

Re: Brexit
 

Surely you mean those pro-Brexiters in office who have struggled to find another gravy train to ride if the present one finishes

Re: Brexit
 

What is missing is civility in the discussion. Not everyone on either side is rabid about their decision and some are allowed to have doubts and possibly to change their mind and their stance without being attacked for doing so as the last I knew we are still a democracy.

Re: Brexit
 

That’s usually how discussions framed principally in ideology go. Uncompromising.

Re: Brexit
 

:clap::clap:

Re: Brexit
 

Re: Brexit
 

Only if we as individuals allow it to happen.We can refuse to join in with those that refuse to be civil.;)

Re: Brexit
 

Democracy can be measured by how much respect is shown for a democratic vote. Leave WON, apparently. The disrespect is being shown the Remain side. If Remain had won there would be nothing like the outright sabotage that is going on.


Every single thing that is going on is aimed fully at preventing the outcome of the democratic vote.

Re: Brexit
 

Yes Brexit is a highly divisive and emotive topic of that there is no doubt but being civil is very easy at the end of the day as its a bit like disagreements in ones family as family members might disagree on a good many things in life but generally always remain civil to each other despite their disagreements.

Re: Brexit
 

Re: Brexit
 

A key difference with family arguments is that with Brexit there is a majority verdict.



With a family argument, if there was a majority or agreed decision, then those trying to subvert that decision would rightly be criticised.

Re: Brexit
 

That’s because we don’t live in a true democracy. There’s an illusion of it. Power in this country is dominated by a ruling elite in politics and the media (even half the comedians ffs). Oxford and Cambridge aren’t elite universities solely because of the quality of education. It’s the circles you move into (and their extended families) that have dominated much of public life for centuries. You’re buying a place within that.

Cameron offered the referendum on the basis of thinking it was a slam dunk and he could heal divisions within the Conservative party.

The establishment is simply trying to correct its error (offering the referendum in the first place). The opinions of you, me and the general population are irrelevant really. An unelected House of
Lords and a lack of proportional representation ensure nothing can change significantly.

Re: Brexit
 

Any lack of respect and civility is coming from the Remain side. None of the delays and discussions are aimed at being prepared. They are ONLY aimed at preventing Brexit.


Just imagine if the outcome of the last or a future referendum on Scottish Independence went the same way as this. At least the "Remain" side(No to independence) in that situation wouldn't obstruct the outcome to the same extent and would complain if it was. That is a truly sinister aspect of all this. Only certain opinions are allowed. Certain groups cannot be criticised, no matter what. You do so, on "pain of death". EG your career is over.

Re: Brexit
 

Ahhh, be nice ;)

I think most of us here are reasonably well informed on the structures of the EU and out Government. The disagreement comes on what that actually means.

The EU way of doing things is different from the UK as the executive and legislative are separate organisations. To an extent, the EU system is like the US system with the President setting policy and the houses voting on those policies.

So yes, the system is different. Is it wrong, no. Is it perfect, no. Is it better or worse than the UK system? That's where we disagree. In my view, it's not better or worse, just different.

Of course, when the executive and legislative disagree, that's when the fun begins - see where we are now in the UK and recent shutdown in the US. Looking through Votewatch Europe, the Parliament seems to vote against proposals roughly 10-15% of the time suggesting a reasonably good alignment between the Commission and Parliament but that isn't too much of a surprise as the makup of the commissioners is roughly the same as the makeup of the Parliament in terms of party affiliation (interestingly, the UK Commissioner is non-aligned)

Contrast this with the UK Government losing a vote on proposed legislation. Then, all hell breaks loose!

Re: Brexit
 

I don’t think you can reasonably say all of those in favour of a delay want to prevent Brexit. We aren’t prepared, and were never prepared for March 29, for a no deal scenario. It’s reasonable for anyone to suggest an extension on that basis (remainer or leave side).