Brexit deal

[The Red Baron]

I listened to a bunch of MPs this morning who were saying they need more time to consider their options on Brexit! FFS, they've had three bloody years! No wonder much of the public has lost patience with MPs.

[Axholme Lion]

I listened to a bunch of MPs this morning who were saying they need more time to consider their options on Brexit! FFS, they've had three bloody years! No wonder much of the public has lost patience with MPs.

I think it was Letwin on Radio 4 this morning discussing indicative voting and he more or less said that various options could not be voted on in the HOC by ranking them in preference because 'Parliament in not used to voting in such a way'. Well if they're incapable of ranking half a dozen choices give or take in their order of preference I suggest they all go and sign on, because in my book it makes the whole lot of them unemployable in the real world.

[The Red Baron]

I know MPs complain about the amount of abuse they, and certainly much of the stuff is totally unjustified. But sometimes some of them make me want to weep.

There's a deal on the table, and no guarantee that the EU will negotiate further. It's a poor deal, but it is because our negotiating strategy has been hopelessly weak. Agree it and then talk about the future relationship. Otherwise we'll be at the cliff edge in three weeks time.

The MPs are like squabbling kids. You have the urge to bang their heads together.

[Axholme Lion]

I know MPs complain about the amount of abuse they, and certainly much of the stuff is totally unjustified. But sometimes some of them make me want to weep.

There's a deal on the table, and no guarantee that the EU will negotiate further. It's a poor deal, but it is because our negotiating strategy has been hopelessly weak. Agree it and then talk about the future relationship. Otherwise we'll be at the cliff edge in three weeks time.

The MPs are like squabbling kids. You have the urge to bang their heads together.

Agreed, the negotiating by the UK has been shite.

[The Red Baron]

The leader of the SNP at Westminster is as thick as mince and wants to try listening.

[MachoMadness]

Scary stuff at Parliament right now. May just said that she wouldn't accept customs union membership even if MPs voted for it. f**king hell.

[DonnyOsmond]

Scary stuff at Parliament right now. May just said that she wouldn't accept customs union membership even if MPs voted for it. f**king hell.

She's power mad.

[The Red Baron]

Scary stuff at Parliament right now. May just said that she wouldn't accept customs union membership even if MPs voted for it. f**king hell.

She's power mad.

It's always the same with her. My way or the highway. No wonder she can't find an acceptable compromise.

I'm beginning to like the sound of the Kyle-Wilson plan, although effectively it means we won't leave for at least two years.

[foxbat]

No Chance of Brexit surviving 2 years.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Our negotiations HAVE been shite but you need to see why.

May's massive mistakes have been

a) to initially interpret a knife edge vote as a mandate for a Brexit that satisfied only the Far Right

b) then have to move from that to satisfy the EU, thereby losing the support of the Right and

c) to act as though she had enough control of Parliament to get support for whatever she put to them.

Three awful, awful mistakes that have brought us to where we are now.

A grown up negotiation would have recognised those three issues from the start. They defined our negotiating position.

She should have started from an understanding that 2016 was NOT a mandate for a hard Brexit and gone for an approach like Norway+ which would have got grudging support from all sides.

Trouble is, as folk are saying on here, she's psychologically incapable of finding those compromises. She sees herself as the image of Maggie (which was only ever an image - she knew when she had to compromise) whilst really being utterly without power.

[Ldr]

Conversely a grown up house of commons would not of spent the last 2 years undermining the UK negotiating position. It would have presented a United front to ensure an better deal could be struck.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Ldr.

And there's the rub.

What better deal could we have negotiated?

The EU has been solid from the start in saying that if we want a trade deal, we MUST ensure that Brexit doesn't f**k the Irish border.

That requires us to stay in the CU, cut off Northern Ireland from GB, or come up with a magic technological solution.

Unless you assume that the EU was going to buckle on Ireland (they never were, because that would have meant the end of the EU) tell me what Parliament could have done to strengthen our negotiating position.

[Ldr]

We will never know what could have been accomplished given how things went on, I'll never trust a politician again, likely never vote again (spoil the paper so I have turned out).

As for the Irish border, we have no business being there in the first place. The island of Ireland should be a single territorial unit

[Copps is Magic]

Conversely a grown up house of commons would not of spent the last 2 years undermining the UK negotiating position. It would have presented a United front to ensure an better deal could be struck.

Parliament is not there to be a united front. That's the role of the government.

The role of the parliament is to hold the government to account, debate things, pass legislation and offer a level of scrutiny and accountability.

[Ldr]

I'd agree in principal, in this instance though it should have acted in the national interest of getting the best deal possible. Imagine trying to sell your car whilst your other half is telling the buyer everything wrong with it.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Ldr.

Right. May said way back that no British PM could countenance any deal that treated NI differently to GB.

So, again, what should Parliament have done?

There WAS an obvious solution. We stay in the CU as an entire country. May decided in January 2017 that leaving the CU was the Will of The People.

So again, what should Parliament have done?

[Ldr]

You don't undermine your negotiations whilst they are still going on which has happened for the last 2 years. That's what it should have done differently

[BillyStubbsTears]

So, again. How has Parliament undermined the negotiations? And what could Parliament have done to strengthen our negotiating hand?

[Ldr]

MPs sounding off in the press, torys backstabbing, labour and SNP sniping. Everyone has been playing party politics when the focus should have been on the negotiating. Debate should have happened afterwards. The deal s poorer than I believe could have been obtained if a United front was presented. You are an intelligent man, you don't sit at a poker table with your own colleagues showing the other side your cards do you?

[BillyStubbsTears]

So again. How could our negotiating hand have been strengthened? If Parliament had agreed to support whatever May said (ignore the fact that that would be in direct contravention of Parliament's role) what could the EU have been forced into offering us?

[Ldr]

See above, I don't believe you are stupid so can only conclude you are being deliberately obtuse

[BillyStubbsTears]

No. I'm not.

Given the position that May took in January 2017, I do not see what possible deal we could have got that is better than the one she finally struck.

The EU was never, ever going to give us a deal that f**ked over Ireland. That's the top and bottom of it. What we did get was the EU going as far as they possibly could by giving May a way out of her idiotic stance on the CU, by means of the backstop.

Nothing Parliament could have done could have improved on that.

The massive mistake if Leavers (and no offence but it appears you're still making it) was to assume that the EU would be so scared of us leaving that they'd cave in and give us whatever we wanted.

That was a massive misunderstanding. What the EU is far more concerned about is doing something that fatally damages the unity of the EU. Like abandoning Ireland.

Understand that, and all the discussion about us being strong in negotiations is just piss and wind.

[Ldr]

I'm not that naive to think that, we will never know what may have been achieved in other areas though do we? I can't get my head round not doing everything possible to get the best deal THEN debate it rather than pull everything to pieces through the whole process.

[BillyStubbsTears]

What other areas?

This is the Withdrawal Agreement that just sets the basic terms.

And the overwhelmingly key issue is Ireland. Once May had decided that Brexit=Leaving the CU, we were never going to get a WA on better terms than we have. The EU has gone right up to its limit in giving us the backstop.

This is not the fault of Parliament. This was set in stone when May was going all Boudicea in January 2017.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Meanwhile, who'd have thought it?

The Govt's ex-professional trade negotiator says we'll get worse trade deals outside the EU than we have inside.

https://www.businessinsider.com/says-liam-fox-former-trade-chief-2019-3?r=US&IR=T

Funny how non-professionals like Fox and Johnson and Farage and Rees-Mogg and Gove have been telling us the opposite.

Who do you trust more?

[The Red Baron]

The Oliver Left-wing amendment has been carried. Brexit is now over. A dreadful day for democracy. Goodnight and goodbye.

[DonnyOsmond]

The Oliver Left-wing amendment has been carried. Brexit is now over. A dreadful day for democracy. Goodnight and goodbye.

What alternative would you have wanted? A third meaningful vote? This hopefully shows what would get through which IMO will be Norway+.

[wilts rover]

The Oliver Left-wing amendment has been carried. Brexit is now over. A dreadful day for democracy. Goodnight and goodbye.

What alternative would you have wanted? A third meaningful vote? This hopefully shows what would get through which IMO will be Norway+.

I feel obliged to point out to the honourable gentlemen that earlier this afternoon the government (Mrs May) said that they would not be obliged to carry out the result of any indicative vote if they did not agree with them. I wouldn't be cashing in just yet if I were you.

[SydneyRover]

I'm not that naive to think that, we will never know what may have been achieved in other areas though do we? I can't get my head round not doing everything possible to get the best deal THEN debate it rather than pull everything to pieces through the whole process.

LDR, If you have not grasped the idea by now that the EU is not going to give the UK as a departing member a better deal than the other remaining (27 remoaning countries) members then I respectfully suggest that you are never going to get it and to take it back to it's origins all those that voted to leave that keep arguing for a better deal noting that we are in the third year of this bullshit never had a clue what they were voting for nor for what's at stake.

Furthermore if any leavers think the UK are the embarrassment of the world at this time due to our position this is nothing to what the UK will look like within weeks of leaving with no-deal or months with any other deal, think of the UK as the Titanic and the 27 member countries waving as we sail off band playing into the ice fields of trade deal negotiations where everyone has seen our hand.

 5,647,971 signatures

[BillyStubbsTears]

TRB

A tad melodramatic.

What the vote tonight has done, is finally put May in a box and allowed Parliament to take over from a catastrophically bad PM.

What this is likely to lead to is anyone's guess, but if it's put down the hijacking of Brexit by the ERG then it is a fine day for democracy.