Brexit: the referendum

Garrison said:
The thing is the economic troubles Remain is predicting have already started. Every time a poll comes out showing leave ahead the FTSE dips and there's run on the pound.
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"A run on the pound" has a nostalgic ring to it.

Indeed, the fore-math to the aftermath isn't looking too promising.

In the event of a leave win in the referendum you can expect that to accelerate and create exactly the situation Osborne is warning about.
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You've chosen your ground there; some others have, of course, chosen the "that's alarmist nonsense" ground.

I think Osborne may have over-cooked it a bit, but not much. If the growth and spending assumptions underlying this year's budget get too wildly out of line there will have to be some sort of review.

Meanwhile, chaos in the cabinet-room and nobody actually governing the country. Now I think about it, I'll come join you on your ground.
 
uke2se said:
The UK has the same ability to make things better as everyone else. Disagree with Eastern European nations? Get together with likeminded nations and outvote them.
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The like-minded thrifty group of UK, DE, DK, SE, NL, EE usually has enough votes in the Council to block bad new suggestions under qualified majority voting until they can be reworked or the French work their magic. The spendy group (broadly everyone else, depending on the issue) has to pick people off from this if they want to get something awful through.

Roofgardener said:
The theoretical procedure is that Ivan Rogers, the UK’s Permanent Representative to the Council of the European Union, would present a diplomatic note to Donald Tusk, the President of the aforementioned council, stating that the UK wishes to activate Article 50 of the Treaty of the European Union ("Lisbon").

At this point, all members of the Council are summoned with instructions to run around like headless chickens.

It is possible that nobody will notice the difference between this, and any OTHER meeting of the council.

A two-year period begins, in which the UK will have to negotiate a future relationship with the EU. The terms of this negotiation will have to be ratified by 72% of the Council of the European Union, plus a simple majority in the European Parliament.

Failure to ratify on the above terms will cause additional mass Gallus gallus domesticus decapitationus
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Nice summary, and also nice to see Ivan Rogers' name. I bet he is only getting about 2hours sleep a night at the moment.

When you say 'any other meeting of the council', you could add 'configuration' as well.

Stuart said:
Not 100% true. When Cameron "gave" £1500 to every house holder that was flooded didn't come from government coffers - it came from the EU. Eden project would not have been completed if it wasn't for cash from the EU, so we do get some of it back one way or another
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I confess I don't know which EU fund this money came from, but it will have been knocked in part off the rebate - or in the case of the Eden project that'll form part of the 'half' people have talked about. The UK government can actually apply for more money under certain funds than it does, but then the rebate goes down, which is a political no.
 
jimbob said:
It's perfectly reasonable to point out that one side is being far more dishonest.
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That, to me, seems a red herring. Trying to ascribe any sort of better moral standing to the side that, for example, only lies 20% while the other lies 50% of the time, seems to miss the important point: both sides have lied. Consequently, both sides have sacrificed their credibility and any claim to a high moral ground.

(And to get into details, how exactly has it been objectively established that one side has been more dishonest than the other? What is the criteria for the measurement? What was the methodology? Which sources were examined for their statements? Et cetera and so forth.)
 
Archie Gemmill Goal said:
That's a very particular interpretation of the question and not one I would agree with.
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Please elaborate. It seems to me when you strip away everything else you end up at the fundamental level I described.


Archie Gemmill Goal said:
Nobody has said that one side tells the truth. You won't find a more vocal critic of Cameron and Osborne than me. The Remain campaign talks a lot of rubbish at times but the Leave campaign has been downright dishonest and has played to people's prejudices and bigotry on immigration in particular.
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See the parenthetical aside in my prior post.
 
You have to wonder if the murder of Jo Cox will make the Leave-swaying voters realise what sort of monster they've unleashed and they might just change.

It'd be a fitting memorial.
 
@Corsair,

The central claim of the Leave campaign is that EU membership costs the UK £350 million a week. That's untrue as there is a rebate that can't be removed without the agreement of the UK. It also ignores the money that the EU sends to the UK.

Boris Johnson has made lots of laughable claims, for example that we currently can't buy bananas in bunches of more than three, which is objectively untrue and can be shown to be so by a visit to almost any supermarket.

The sums of the Leave campaign don't add up and the key ones are not just wishful thinking.

In short, to echo Archie Gemmill Goal, both sides lie but the Leave side are nasty liars. As Johnson is using this as a vehicle to number ten, it is valid to look at his character.
 
jimbob said:
@Corsair,

The central claim of the Leave campaign is that EU membership costs the UK £350 million a week. That's untrue as there is a rebate that can't be removed without the agreement of the UK. It also ignores the money that the EU sends to the UK.

Boris Johnson has made lots of laughable claims, for example that we currently can't buy bananas in bunches of more than three, which is objectively untrue and can be shown to be so by a visit to almost any supermarket.

The sums of the Leave campaign don't add up and the key ones are not just wishful thinking.

In short, to echo Archie Gemmill Goal, both sides lie but the Leave side are nasty liars. As Johnson is using this as a vehicle to number ten, it is valid to look at his character.
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Is that a rough script outline for a late Channel 4 attempted comedy programme ?
I will not go into details , save to say , selective cherry picking .
Why not simply say that you are predisposed to voting one given way , and that you recognise that neither side can make any believable future predictions and from default have separately resorted to extravagance and drama ? Let alone the promotion of Fear .
 
cullennz said:
Pretty harsh dude. Was just a nutter
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Obviously he was a nutter. But had he been "radicalised" by one side or another of the Brexit controversy? We don't know, because I don't think the allegation that he shouted "put Britain first" or something like that has been substantiated: and even if he did shout it, what did it mean? We may find out the answer to these questions in due course.
 
Craig B said:
Obviously he was a nutter. But had he been "radicalised" by one side or another of the Brexit controversy? We don't know, because I don't think the allegation that he shouted "put Britain first" or something like that has been substantiated: and even if he did shout it, what did it mean? We may find out the answer to these questions in due course.
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True. It will come out.

May have just been sacked by an immigrant at some stage in the past
 
Craig B said:
... I don't think the allegation that he shouted "put Britain first" or something like that has been substantiated: and even if he did shout it, what did it mean? We may find out the answer to these questions in due course.
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I doubt there will ever be more than those witnesses who have made that claim. It's not likely to be on CCTV.

Anyway, that story is out there, having been reported across the media and the damage has been done.
 
Malbec said:
Is that a rough script outline for a late Channel 4 attempted comedy programme ?
I will not go into details , save to say , selective cherry picking .
Why not simply say that you are predisposed to voting one given way , and that you recognise that neither side can make any believable future predictions and from default have separately resorted to extravagance and drama ? Let alone the promotion of Fear .
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Why not? Because it would be untrue.

I've had my mind made up from the start and can't stand Cameron or Osborne or most of the Remain side. If they were lying I'd call them on it. And have done. They are guilty of exaggerating their claims to worry voters.

The Exit side are simply dishonest. Facts are against their claims and yet they continue to make them regardless. They have literally nothing else bar bigotry.
 
The Atheist said:
I doubt there will ever be more than those witnesses who have made that claim. It's not likely to be on CCTV.

Anyway, that story is out there, having been reported across the media and the damage has been done.
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Depends whether killer is forthcoming....
 
Roofgardener said:
I'm in the Brexit camp, primarily for reasons of geopolitics rather than economics.

However, I am appalled at the shoddy quality of the campaigning, and the appalling mis-use of statistics and "facts" by BOTH sides.

This referendum must surely go down in history as the most bad-tempered ever !
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I'm in the same camp and I agree with you. This referendum campaign has been terrible. Whatever happens the aftermath is going to definitely be 'interesting times'
 
The Atheist said:
You have to wonder if the murder of Jo Cox will make the Leave-swaying voters realise what sort of monster they've unleashed and they might just change.

It'd be a fitting memorial.
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I've already voted. Had I not I wouldn't change my strongly held beliefs based on one nutjob. We live in a free society and part of the cost of that is that sometimes bad people do terrible things.

We're free to hold whatever beliefs we choose, and that means that some people hold reprehensible racist, bigoted views. We tolerate those people, up until the point they start harming others.
 
Corsair 115 said:
It is proper skepticism to assume or assert that one side is always lying and the other side is always telling the truth? Shouldn't such judgements be reserved until a full and proper appraisal of all information is done? One can certainly have a leaning towards or against a side, but final judgement should be based on evidence and reason, should it not?
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Yes, it definitely should, and evidence and reason tells us that one side lies considerably more than the other.
 
Ambrosia said:
I've already voted. Had I not I wouldn't change my strongly held beliefs based on one nutjob. We live in a free society and part of the cost of that is that sometimes bad people do terrible things.

We're free to hold whatever beliefs we choose, and that means that some people hold reprehensible racist, bigoted views. We tolerate those people, up until the point they start harming others.
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I would agree that we shouldn't jump to condemn entire groups based on the actions of a few nutjobs. I wish everyone also took the same approach when the perpetrators were foreign or a bit brown.
 
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