UK & EU Agree Post-Brexit Trade Deal

[OLD BOY]

Originally Posted by Mr K

Just goes to what farcical political cobblers the honours system is. IDS has been knighted, for what??? Services to the benefits system !?

Anyway all victims of Universal Credit now know his home address
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...-a9262486.html
Oops !

Actually, Universal Credit is a much better system than the one it replaces.

The problem is that in line with the austerity measures that were necessary following the Labour Government's period of rule, the funding of it had to be reduced. Restore the funding, as I believe Boris intends to do, and most of the problems will melt away.

[Mr K]

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

Actually, Universal Credit is a much better system than the one it replaces.

The problem is that in line with the austerity measures that were necessary following the Labour Government's period of rule, the funding of it had to be reduced. Restore the funding, as I believe Boris intends to do, and most of the problems will melt away.

Yeah that's right OB, all problems will melt away, much like the polar ice caps....

Originally Posted by nomadking

The people receiving the honours get advance notice, so that will reduce the time frame.

Indeed, however as I said, peerages can be created at any time and are not subject to the same timetable as the rest of the honours system. Had they intended to grant Bercow a peerage on his retirement as speaker, it would have been done.

[1andrew1]

Anyone remember Brexiter Patrick Minford's statements about manufacturing post-Brexit being largely unviable?

Looks like we could be going down that path.

https://twitter.com/mattholehouse/st...02014352183296

BREAKING: MPs have approved Boris Johnson's EU Withdrawal Bill Agreement at 3rd reading with a majority of 99.

Ayes: 330
NOES: 231

Bill will now go to House of Lords and is not expected to add any significant Amendment due to the size of the Conservative Governments Majority that will simply just remove them when the bill comes back to the Commons.

[richard s]

Whoopee do.

Originally Posted by richard s

Whoopee do.

Pointless response award of the week goes to... ^^^^

[1andrew1]

Description of how trade deal talks might go. Suggests more of a Swiss-type arrangement than a Canadian deal.
https://www.rte.ie/news/brexit/2020/...-brexit-talks/

[jonbxx]

Originally Posted by 1andrew1

Description of how trade deal talks might go. Suggests more of a Swiss-type arrangement than a Canadian deal.
https://www.rte.ie/news/brexit/2020/...-brexit-talks/

That would be the way to go considering the geographic and commercial closeness of the EU and UK. Gonna be a hell of a hard sell if anything close the EU-Switzerland agreement come out at the end. Many red lines would need to be quietly pushed to the side...

A Bill regarding Referendums is currently going through Parliament.

https://publications.parliament.uk/p...09/5801009.pdf

1 Referendums criteria

(1) A proposition to change constitutional or parliamentary arrangements that is the subject of a referendum in the United Kingdom is deemed to be disagreed to (notwithstanding the form in which the question appears on ballot papers) unless the following criteria are met.

(2) Before the referendum is held—
(a) each House of Parliament passes a motion that the proposition be agreed to, and
(b) if in either House the motion is passed on a division, the number of members who vote in favour of the motion is equal to or greater than two thirds of the number of those who vote.

(3) The number of those who vote in the referendum is equal to or greater than 55% of all those on the current electoral register.

(4) The number of those who vote in favour of the proposition is equal to or greater than 60% of those who vote in the referendum.

2 Extent, commencement and short title

(1) This Act extends to England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
(2) This Act comes into force on the day on which it is passed.
(3) This Act may be cited as the Referendums Criteria Act 2020.

For comparison with European Referendum Act 2015 :-
In the House of Commons, it passed 316 votes to 53 on its third reading in the Commons (so would have met Section 2b)
In the actual Referendum vote, 35,577,342 out of 46,500,001 Registered Voters voted, which was 72.21% (so would have met Section 3)
17,410,742 out of the 35,577,342 voters voted to leave, which was 51.89% of those who voted (so would not have met Section 4)

[papa smurf]

Originally Posted by Hugh

A Bill regarding Referendums is currently going through Parliament.

https://publications.parliament.uk/p...09/5801009.pdf



For comparison with European Referendum Act 2015 :-
In the House of Commons, it passed 316 votes to 53 on its third reading in the Commons (so would have met Section 2b)
In the actual Referendum vote, 35,577,342 out of 46,500,001 Registered Voters voted, which was 72.21% (so would have met Section 3)
17,410,742 out of the 35,577,342 voters voted to leave, which was 51.89% of those who voted (so would not have met Section 4)

So does thet scupper any future referendum to rejoin the EU and any chance of Scotland leaving the union.

Originally Posted by Hugh

A Bill regarding Referendums is currently going through Parliament.

https://publications.parliament.uk/p...09/5801009.pdf



For comparison with European Referendum Act 2015 :-
In the House of Commons, it passed 316 votes to 53 on its third reading in the Commons (so would have met Section 2b)
In the actual Referendum vote, 35,577,342 out of 46,500,001 Registered Voters voted, which was 72.21% (so would have met Section 3)
17,410,742 out of the 35,577,342 voters voted to leave, which was 51.89% of those who voted (so would not have met Section 4)

More interestingly for the immediate future, the quorum clause might allow opponents of Scottish independence to defeat a future referendum simply by failing to vote at all (I haven’t done the maths yet ... the 2014 referendum had a turnout of around 80%). It also makes it impossible for the SNP to edge it - they would need to increase their vote by more than 15 percentage points, rather than just a shade over 5. For this reason the Nats could be expected to become especially shrill in any Commons debate.

However, this is a private members bill that has been introduced in the Lords. Cormack is a Tory peer but AFAIK this isn’t government policy and I’ll be surprised if it passes its second reading, which would mean it wouldn’t appear in the Commons at all, unless el gov decided to directly introduce their own version of it at some stage.

[djfunkdup]

Originally Posted by Hugh

A Bill regarding Referendums is currently going through Parliament.

https://publications.parliament.uk/p...09/5801009.pdf



For comparison with European Referendum Act 2015 :-
In the House of Commons, it passed 316 votes to 53 on its third reading in the Commons (so would have met Section 2b)
In the actual Referendum vote, 35,577,342 out of 46,500,001 Registered Voters voted, which was 72.21% (so would have met Section 3)
17,410,742 out of the 35,577,342 voters voted to leave, which was 51.89% of those who voted (so would not have met Section 4)

Diz at mean its gonny cost us more fir ma fish fingers oot farmfoods ?

[1andrew1]

EU confirms that UK has signed up to border checks between the mainland and Northern Ireland...contradicting BoJo

There will be border checks on trade inside the UK under the Brexit deal negotiated by Boris Johnson, the EU’s chief negotiator has said. Michel Barnier confirmed there would be “checks and controls” between Britain and Northern Ireland under the agreement that will govern the UK’s exit from the EU.

Boris Johnson falsely claimed several times during the general election campaign that there would be no checks on the Irish sea, and was accused by the opposition of lying. Whether the prime minister had misunderstood the agreement he had signed or was indeed lying to the public, the text of the deal signed in November is clear that there will indeed be checks.

“The implementation of this foresees checks and controls entering the island of Ireland,” Mr Barnier said during a sitting of the European Parliament.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...-a9283686.html

[tweetiepooh]

There will be no checks ON the Irish Sea. The checks will be before or after or we will rename the body of water the Irish Channel and the statement would still be true.

I'm sure there will be plenty of "weasling" on all sides for many years to come.