[Politics] Brexit

Hampster Gull said:

Just watched TOTP2, Wham Special. It was good. Didn’t really like them at the time but enjoyed that

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Lincoln Imp said:

The irony of this post is completely off the scale.

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Baldseagull said:

Whatever their reasoning, and it would be crazy to think that Brexit was in no way a factor, even if just because of the current uncertainty, it will result in a reduced tax take by UK treasury.

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Herr Tubthumper said:

The Army way? I certainly dont think Russia is going to come along and help you beat the Germans this time.

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ManOfSussex said:

I appreciate you're an internet tough guy, but you're not half as smart as you think you are. #justsaying

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larus said:

Think you should read post #45838 if you still think this was a Brexit choice.

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larus said:

Yes, those tight Germans who are so f*cking rich that they can’t afford their 2% defence commitment to NATO. Happy to sponge of other countries and, at the same time, see other nations (Greece, Spain) suffer because of the stupidity of the EURO.

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Baldseagull said:

I was just saying it would have been in mind when making the decision, other factors may have been larger, but Brexit would have been a con on the case for Britain side.

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Westdene Seagull said:

And would no doubt expect NATO to come and protect them if the worse happened.

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Mental Lental said:

In addition, it could be argued that there seems to be a misunderstanding, even from the rare "sensible Brexiteer" regarding the power of the Commission itself.

This misunderstanding about the power of the Commission perhaps stems from a comparison with the British system of government. Unlike the British government, which commands a majority in the House of Commons, the Commission does not command an in-built majority in the EU Council or the European Parliament. Therefore it has to build a coalition issue-by-issue. This puts the Commission in a much weaker position in the EU system than the British government in the UK system.

Also, I'm gonna address this falsehood that the members of the Commission aren't democratically elected. They are elected but in a manner that is different from how the British people elect the UK government.

Under Article 17 of the EU treaty, the Commission President is formally proposed by the European Council (the 28 heads of government of the EU member states), by a qualified-majority vote, and is then ‘elected’ by a majority vote in the European Parliament. In an effort to inject a bit MORE democracy into this process, the main European party families recently proposed rival candidates for the Commission President before the 2014 European Parliament elections. Then, after the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) won the most seats in the new Parliament, the European Council agreed to propose the EPP’s candidate: Jean-Claude Juncker.

Now, the problem is that the UK has no representation within this new EPP. Do you know why? Because the Tories pulled out of it in 2009. Which meant that in this particular election the British people technically couldn't vote FOR Juncker. Although they still had the power to vote AGAINST him through a veto if the UK parliament so decided (they didn't).

Still with me so far? Most people pass out from boredom by this point...Hey ho let's rumble on.

Once the Commission President is chosen, each EU member state nominates a Commissioner, and each Commissioner is then subject to a hearing in one of the committees of the European Parliament (modelled on US Senate hearings of US Presidential nominees to the US cabinet). If a committee issues a ‘negative opinion’ the candidate is usually withdrawn by the government concerned. After the hearings, the team of 28 is then subject to an up/down ‘investiture vote’ by a simple majority of the MEPs.

As a final democratic measure, the Commission as a whole can be REMOVED by a two-thirds ‘censure vote’ in the European Parliament. This has never happened before, but in 1999 the Santer Commission resigned before a censure vote was due to be taken which they were likely to lose. So, yes, the Commission is not DIRECTLY elected. But it is not strictly true to say that it is ‘unelected’ or UNACCOUNTABLE.

Ironically, the way the Commission is now chosen is similar to the way the UK government is formed. Neither the British Prime Minister nor the British cabinet are ‘directly elected’. Formally, in House of Commons elections, we do not vote on the choice for the Prime Minister, but rather vote for individual MPs from different parties. Then, by convention, the Queen chooses the leader of the largest party in the House of Commons to form a government. This is rather like the European Council choosing the candidate of the political group with the most seats in the European Parliament to become the Commission President.

And anyway, after the UK Prime Minister is chosen, he or she is free to choose his or her cabinet ministers. There are NO hearings of individual ministerial nominees before committees of the House of Commons, and there is NO formal investiture vote in the government as a whole. From this perspective, the Commissioners and the Commission are more scrutinised and MORE accountable than British cabinet ministers.

So there you have it.

EU laws and lawmakers are wholly democratically accountable and people who voted leave under the guise of "no democratic accountability" are misinformed at best. Wilfully ignorant at worst.

I'm done with arguing with Brexit thickos about this shit. This is the LAST TIME. I shall just go back name calling and ignoring now.

It's much less effort.

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pastafarian said:

Have a read from someone who with regard to the democratic deficit of the EU actually knows what they are talking about, and is far more informed than you, hardly a “thicko”.
No need to thank me for aiding to enlighten you, your silence on his words will speak for you.
It may be a little hard to comprehend for someone such as yourself so I have included the moving picture version for you as well.



Ladies and gentlemen, the European Union has become a state. It has the symbols of a state.
It’s got a flag, it’s got the anthem but it is not the only international organisation to have a flag and an anthem – so does FIFA. More importantly it’s got the powers of a state as well. Its laws are our laws. Its laws overrule our laws. Its laws are supreme.
The laws it makes can only come from the Commission. The Commission has the exclusive right to introduce new laws or propose the repeal of old laws. It is entirely unelected.
The European Court of Justice determines what we’ve agreed under the treaties. On a couple of occasions, it interpreted the treaties to mean completely different things from what we believed we had signed up to. For example, the Working Time Directive came in under health and safety laws even when we had an opt-out from the social chapter.
The Commission makes laws in big areas and in small areas alike. We have no control over immigration from the European Union, that is decided by the Commission. We have no control over trade agreements. Those have to be made by the Commission.
We can’t make a free trade agreement with China, with India, with Brazil, or with Russia – it has to be done by the Commission. We have no ability now to make our regulations for the City of London, one of the biggest earners for this country. That is now decided by the Commission.
It makes laws that affect our daily lives as well, in the minutiae of our lives. In my own constituency, a rural constituency, the roll-out of rural broadband has been delayed because the European Union maintains that that is illegal state aid and needs to give us permission to do it.
It is perhaps fortunate that they haven’t taken the same approach to the country lanes, which are surely just as essential, just as important to a rural community as rural broadband now is. The Chancellor has not been able to extend a scheme on reducing duty on fuel in rural areas, because again that requires the permission of the Commission.
In the Budget, the British Parliament, the House of Commons unanimously agreed to abolish the VAT charge on tampons. Could it do this? No. All the Prime Minister could do was go to Brussels, and at a dinner discussing the tragedy of migration, he had to raise the question with the other heads of state and government of women’s sanitary products.
When he did so, could the Council, the democratically elected heads of state and government do anything about it? Far from it. All they could do was ask the Commission if it would bring forward proposals.
The Commission has very generously, kindly, thoughtfully, benevolently said that it may bring forward such proposals but interestingly, it is waiting until after the 23rd of June to do so.
The EU has the symbols of the state and the powers of a state, and it makes laws in a way that is not democratically accountable. But it is worse than that, because it’s a failed state. Look at what the EU has done and what it fails to do. Look at its failings and then see that it wants more powers still, when no doubt it will fail further.
Look at the Common Agricultural Policy. 40% of EU spending goes on the Common Agricultural Policy, but it makes farmers less efficient. It makes consumer prices more expensive and it hits the poorest farmers in the world by making it hard for them to export their products to us.
If you take farmers, farmers in my constituency complain about the three-crop rule, and the ban on the neonicotinoids, and the red tape and the paperwork they have to fill in that makes them less productive farmers.
They are also hit with high costs. There are tariffs on agricultural chemicals to protect the German chemical industry and this feeds through to higher prices for food – so it makes the production of food less competitive, and it makes prices for consumers higher.
Higher because of these additional costs, imposed for no good reason, and higher because of tariffs imposed on the rest of the world, sometimes the poorest in the world, who would often find agriculture is the first way of beginning to get on a path to economic growth.
But they are denied that right. They are denied that ability because the EU runs a failed Common Agricultural Policy. It is our money too – the money our farmers get in the UK has come from the British taxpayer. How much better, more sensible to do it for ourselves.
If the Common Agricultural Policy is bad, the Common Fisheries Policy is probably worse. The destruction it has wrought on fishing communities, the destruction of fishing communities by about half from where they were in 1973, is one of the great tragedies of our membership.
The fishing communities may have been small, and they are now smaller, but surely we should have a fellow-feeling for our fellow citizens in this country whose livelihoods have now been ruined, whose communities have been damaged, by a fishing policy that has made the once-richest seas in the world empty.
We have had trouble with cod, cod being almost endangered, though the stocks have now begun to recover, and with sea bass. It is now illegal to catch a single one. If you go off from Weymouth and charter a boat, and you catch a single sea bass you have committed a criminal offence because of the European Union. What a tragedy the Common Fisheries Policy has been.
Then think of the things we are not involved in, but are essential to the European project. The Euro. The Euro is a catastrophe. It has crushed the economies of the southern member states, of Portugal, of Greece, of Italy, of Spain. Youth unemployment in Greece is 47.2%, with similar levels in Spain and in Portugal.
Think of the hopes, the ambitions of young people in those countries crushed by an economic scheme that is really there to lead a political project. Look at Italy, 11.4% unemployment, double the rate in the United Kingdom. No economic growth since 2000, and crushed by the Euro.
The answer, of course, from the European Union, the Commission, is to have more Europe.
So they have done it badly, and therefore they will now do it worse by taking more powers. They will have a fiscal union to go with the monetary union, so there is more centralisation of power, more ignoring of democratic choices – so when the Greeks vote not to have austerity, their vote is ignored in a referendum.
That is par for the course. The European Union always ignores referendums. Let’s hope it doesn’t ignore ours. It ignored the French one on the constitution. The Irish one on Lisbon. The Danish one on Maastricht. The Netherlands one also on the constitution.
They just got brushed aside and the project marched on, because the answer is always more Europe, even when the project has ostensibly failed.
Perhaps even worse than the Euro is the tragedy of the migrant crisis, a migrant crisis that has led to over a million people coming to the European Union, for which the European Union must take its share of the blame.
Mrs Merkel, the Pied Piper of Berlin, summoning people to come to Germany who then came, taking these incredibly risky journeys where 15 out of every 1,000 who travelled have died. This real tragedy, this blot on the conscience of Europe, for which Europe has responsibility.
Why? Partly because Schengen took away internal borders. As the Prime Minister of Hungary said, nobody wanted to go to Hungary, so when they knew they could only get through country-by-country, the journey was much less attractive.
Partly because of the view of human rights that meant that if you were rescued, instead of being taken back home, you had a right to come into the European Union – and therefore people took increasingly risky journeys knowing that if they were rescued, they would get in.
So people take leaky boats and risk their lives. This has encouraged a mass movement of people for which there was then no proper provision when they arrived, and where many people have died in the process.
Once again, what is the solution? The solution is more Europe. Let us have a European border force. That’ll be the right answer. Let us make sure that Europe takes charge, because having destroyed internal borders and therefore stopped any control in the continent itself, we will be really good at doing it across the whole of the border of the European Union. The answer to failure is always the same.
You have a failed state. A failed state on the Agricultural Policy, a failed state on the Fisheries Policy, a failed state on the Euro, and a failed state on migration. That is what we have tied ourselves up to – but as we tie ourselves up to it we have lost our democratic right. Once it is a European competence, we cannot change the law.
How you vote at a general election cannot change what happens, so the parties draw up manifestos, but anything they say on agriculture is all irrelevant. It’s all decided by EU. Anything on trade. It’s all decided by the EU.
Specific promises in manifestos turn out to be undeliverable because of the EU. The Conservatives, in their last manifesto, said that they would stop paying child benefit to people whose children did not live in this country. A pretty modest and reasonable request, but it is not allowed under European Law.
The Conservatives also said they would bring migration down to the tens of thousands from the hundreds of thousands, not allowed under European Law. So how people vote is of less importance.
In 1997 and 2010, the British people had the appearance of a complete change of government, but they could only change the government in relation to things that were not decided by the European Union. Anything that is with Europe is not any longer our democratic right.
This has a number of effects. Some of our laws come in in spite of the opposition of the British Government. We only have under Lisbon 8% of the votes on the Council of Ministers, which is lower than the proportionate share
We have one MEP for every 450,000 of population against one for every 70,000 from Malta. Again, beneath our proportionate share and more like the pre-1832 Parliament than the one we have got now so we cannot stop laws coming in.
David Cameron has lost every single vote in the Council of Ministers since he has been Prime Minister, forty of them since 2010, so we do not get our own way within the EU.
Then you cannot as a constituent, as a British citizen, seek redress of grievance once it is with Europe. I have had cases of this as a local MP.
People come to me when they have been maltreated by the bureaucracy, whether it is the council or the government or Europe. When it is the council or the government, the response from official bodies is usually pretty good.
They try to put things right, and there are means of raising them in Parliament if they do not. With Europe, nothing can be done. When it is the European Union, the British government may be penalised if it helps a constituent.
I had a case of this kind. I was representing a farmer who had lost some of his single farm payment for a very unfair reason. I wrote to the government to say this was unfair, and I got a hopeless letter back.
I wrote again, saying, “No, no, this really is unfair. This farmer is being badly treated.”
That was when I got the truth. The truth was that if the British government allowed this farmer not to be fined, we the British government, the British people, would be fined by the European Union. As we have been. We’ve been fined £650 million in the last ten years by not doing what our European masters want.
This right of redress of grievance is something that has existed since Parliament first assembled in 1265. It is one of our most ancient rights, but once it is a European competence, that ancient right has gone.
This is important for people across the country, of all age groups, of all demographies, because actually it is democracy that determines all the other government’s decisions, determines policies over all other areas.
If you think of the economic prospects of leaving the European Union – if we leave it is decided by us. This is crucial because the reason the UK is one of the richest countries in the world is not because God made it so.
It is because we have the right constitutional framework. Democracy, the rule of law, rights of property, and free speech have constrained corrupt government and made people certain of their contracts, have encouraged them to invest and reap the rewards of their labour.
This is protected by democracy, where if anything goes wrong a government may be replaced by one that will behave properly. It is democracy that has created economic success, not the other way round.
The risk of remaining in a sclerotic, bureaucratic European Union where democracy is held in contempt, is so much greater than leaving and determining our own future democratically. Some people will think Jeremy Corbyn has the answers to the economy, will believe that a collectivist, socialist state will make people more prosperous.
Others will believe as I do, that David Cameron has the right answers. That being open and free-marketing and entrepreneurial will make us a richer and more prosperous nation.
That is a choice for the British people to make and to unmake. It is not a choice to be made by unelected bureaucrats in Brussels.
That, ladies and gentlemen, leaves us with a clear choice on the 23rd of June. The choice is: is your country Europe, and are you European? Or is your country the United Kingdom and are you British?
If you are European, you are voting for a bureaucratic state. A state controlled by an unelected, unaccountable commission. A state where your vote does not count.
If you are voting for the United Kingdom, you are voting for a democratic, free nation.
A nation with a long history of liberty. A nation where your vote counts, and you get the government that you want. It is a clear choice. A choice of vision. A choice of opportunity. A choice of freedom. Is that choice a European superstate, or a free, democratic United Kingdom?
Jacob Rees-Mogg MP for North East Somerset

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The Clamp said:

If that utter rubbish is the kind of meaningless, empty rhetoric that you feel justifies your Leave vote, I feel genuinely sorry for you. If the fact you voted leave doesn't prove how gullible you lot are then that speech certainly does. Pathetic.

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The Clamp said:

What a load of twaddle.

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The Clamp said:

What a load of twaddle.

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pastafarian said:

You are the strange boy who has now convinced himself the referendum itself was “undemocratic” (your words). Apart from being odd you are clearly the worlds worst authority on democracy, your opinion therefore, and as usual is meaningless.
Keep your opinions to the economy, at least you know..............................oh wait.

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GT49er said:

Well thought out, considered and measured response.

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ManOfSussex said:

Anyway, yesterday afternoon amongst the carnage of Gold Cup Day Friday I was talking to a friend of mine, who voted leave, who was telling me about a works seminar he attended last week at Leeds Castle, where the guest speaker was none other than Julie Etchingham from ITV News. 2 things of note:

1. Julie Etchingham is as ever bit as attractive in person as she looks on TV apparently.
2. Whilst in conversation with Julie Etchingham afterwards/as she was working the room, instead of asking her 'what's the naughtiest thing you've ever done?' as I would have done, my friend asked her 'How do you think Brexits going to turn out then?' Julie Etchingham shook her head, rolled her eyes and said 'Oh God'.

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