[Discussion] Brexit means Brexit

Discuss the political fallout and other issues around Britain's exit, Brexit for short, from the EU.

For the sake of clarity, I'm including the full text of Article 50.

Article 50 wrote:

1. Any Member State may decide to withdraw from the Union in accordance with its own constitutional requirements.

2. A Member State which decides to withdraw shall notify the European Council of its intention. In the light of the guidelines provided by the European Council, the Union shall negotiate and conclude an agreement with that State, setting out the arrangements for its withdrawal, taking account of the framework for its future relationship with the Union. That agreement shall be negotiated in accordance with Article 218(3) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. It shall be concluded on behalf of the Union by the Council, acting by a qualified majority, after obtaining the consent of the European Parliament.

3. The Treaties shall cease to apply to the State in question from the date of entry into force of the withdrawal agreement or, failing that, two years after the notification referred to in paragraph 2, unless the European Council, in agreement with the Member State concerned, unanimously decides to extend this period.

4. For the purposes of paragraphs 2 and 3, the member of the European Council or of the Council representing the withdrawing Member State shall not participate in the discussions of the European Council or Council or in decisions concerning it.

A qualified majority shall be defined in accordance with Article 238(3)(b) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union.

5. If a State which has withdrawn from the Union asks to rejoin, its request shall be subject to the procedure referred to in Article 49.

Axon wrote:
Prederick wrote:

Wooooooooooooooooooooooooof. That is.... woof.

Well, that's gotta be Corbyn's time up.

Not by the sounds of it. McDonald is claiming it was a Brexit election and didn't sound all that willing to back down. Of course, it begs the question why did Labour have such a mess of a policy.

Yes, "we didn't fail, everyone failed us" is a fantastically smart approach. A real winner.

From this outside observers perspective it looked like the Tories were cribbing strategies from the Republicans, and having great success doing it. Racism, Xenophobia, and Nationalism are vote winners apparently. I think if the U.S still had the same demographics as the U.K the Republicans would never lose a national election.

I hate this country.

Zona wrote:

I think if the U.S still had the same demographics as England the Republicans would never lose a national election.

pyxistyx wrote:
Zona wrote:

I think if the U.S still had the same demographics as England the Republicans would never lose a national election.

Touché, Scotland is the bright spot in all this. But I really don't see the Tories letting them have another independence referendum.

Clusks wrote:

I hate this country.

Oh I don’t hate the country. I just hate most of the knob ends living in it.

As for the SNP - there will never be a second referendum while a majority government is i office. Scotland is going to be paying a great deal towards Brexit. Mark my words.

The first results are in and Labour have lost Blyth Valley to the conservatives, which isn't that far from where I live. Labour have held that seat since 1950.

I suspect Labour are going to take an utter hammering. How they are going to prize Corbyn out is going to be very amusing in the aftermath of all this. I'm going to bed.

Sorbicol wrote:

The first results are in and Labour have lost Blyth Valley to the conservatives, which isn't that far from where I live. Labour have held that seat since 1950.

I suspect Labour are going to take an utter hammering. How they are going to prize Corbyn out is going to be very amusing in the aftermath of all this. I'm going to bed.

But then you'll miss Boris' victory speech!

I was thinking more:

Zona wrote:
pyxistyx wrote:
Zona wrote:

I think if the U.S still had the same demographics as England the Republicans would never lose a national election.

Touché, Scotland is the bright spot in all this. But I really don't see the Tories letting them have another independence referendum.

Don't worry, Americans like my sister and her husband are doing their best as evangelical missionaries to brainwash enlighten all of you Scots to our bigoted and willfully ignorant ways!

Prederick wrote:

Wooooooooooooooooooooooooof. That is.... woof.

Well, that's gotta be Corbyn's time up.

He just fell on his sword. Only thing he really could do, imo. The man had a -40 approval rating. -40!

Millstone, neck, etc.

If the idiot had done that a year ago we probably wouldn’t be in this mess.

Oh well. Nothing massively surprising this morning. Disgusting and disappointing (south of the border at least) but still... not really surprising.

Northern Ireland:

West Tyrone: Orfhlaith Begley (Sinn Fein) *Hold*

Upper Bann: Carla Lockhart (DUP) *Hold*

Strangford: Jim Shannon (DUP) *Hold*

South Down: Chris Hazzard (Sinn Fein) *Hold*

South Antrim: Paul Girvan (DUP) *Hold*

North Down: Stephen Farry (Alliance Party) *Gain*

North Antrim: Ian Paisley (DUP) *Hold*

Newry & Armagh: Mickey Bradey (Sinn Fein) *Hold*

Mid Ulster: Francie Molloy (Sinn Fein) *Hold*

Lagan Valley: Jeffrey Donaldson (DUP) *Hold*

Foyle: Colum Eastwood (SDLP) *Gain*

Fermanagh and South Tyrone: *To be declared*

East Londonderry: Gregory Campbell (DUP) *Hold*

East Antrim: Sammy Wilson (DUP) *Hold*

Belfast West: Paul Maskey (Sinn Fein) *Hold*

Belfast South: Claire Hanna (SDLP) *Gain*

Belfast North: John Finucane (Sinn Fein) *Gain*

Belfast East: Gavin Robinson (DUP) *Hold*

The electoral map looks like a a disunited kingdom.

Major centres mostly Labor, Wales and Scotland with almost nothing Tory.

Little Britain writ large.

I guess Momentum missed that 80’s nostalgia is the big thing these days, not 70’s.

Not exactly a surprise, but still

@Laura_K_Hughes
Gender breakdown of MPs in the next parliament:

Labour: 104 women, 98 men

Conservatives: 87 women, 277 men

Lib Dems: 7 women, 4 men

SNP: 16 women, 32 men

DUP: 1 woman, 7 men

Sinn Fein: 2 women, 5 men

So I genuinely liked the Corbyn manifesto, I thought I'd put down a few thoughts here. I'm really hoping no one bites my head off for it! I feel a bit dejected today as I imagine a lot of people do:

- In the fallout of all this, there's obviously been backlash at Corbyn, and some of that is deserved, as this election just hasn't worked. There's in-fighting, blame game and "I told you so", but it's all futile. Putting the blame solely at Corbyn's door is short-sighted, in my opinion. It's clear he was never going to win a majority, but a large part of his unelectable image has come from the media and their reporting and, for me, that's a massive takeaway from this. This on top of the Conservative party bringing out a lot of dirty tactics. I don't think people should lose sight of how ugly the campaign was, particularly from the Conservatives. It sets a bad example for future elections, as people just don't want to do research or care that they are being lied to. And being the winning party, absolutely nothing will be done about it. When people get angry at Corbyn, they need to remember who the real villains of this election were.
- I saw one commentator say something akin to "Iraq was a mistake, but should we reconsider the Blair legacy?" I just found it a bit of an atonishing statement. If winning at any cost is what Labour wants, then that's fine, but I was quite happy voting for a left-leaning party due to these policies, I doubt I will vote Labour if they return to Blairism.
- Corbyn went on a platform with solving poverty front and centre, and the country has rejected it. It's my belief that the middle class (although having three classes is a problematic statement now in the UK, as it's clear there's a broader range), although often sympathetic to people like the homeless and the disabled, actually do not care on the whole unless it's actually impacting them. I've been to the supermarket today to make a big shop for the foodbank with my girlfriend, and know plenty of lovely people who do a lot to help, but I also know there are a lot of self-centred people in this country. The fact is, Brexit is bad, but it hasn't been so bad yet that it's hit the people who get by relatively comfortably. It's just impacted the very poor most of all, so I don't think a lot of people truly understand how hard things have become for some people in this country. For a lot of people, feeling like they were "right" in the referendum to vote leave probably mattered more than other people in poverty.
- The wave of poverty porn on television, like benefits street, has not helped with people caring about those who struggle in society. I have a friend who voted Conservative, a teacher no-less, and he said that the parents need to take responsibility of the kids he teaches, as they're all spending their benefits on drugs, alcohol, cigarettes and 65-inch televisions. And this is, unfortunately, a common opinion you'll find across the country - people think the old working class were good honest people who worked in industry, while now they associate it with scroungers.
- One of the points a number of Corbyn attackers claimed after the exit poll was that "the problem is not Brexit, it's that people don't like Corbyn". The fact is, that Brexit was a big problem for Labour, and in the end they tried to make everyone happy which alienated the Leave voters, which took away a number of key seats. But I honestly think it was lose-lose for them. They side with remain, and you'd still get the likes of Blyth and Wrexham being lost. You side with leave, then a lot of remain voters would be annoyed. They went after younger voters but ended up losing a lot of their core, which is probably the biggest failing you can put at Corbyn's door, but I'm honestly lost how they could've solved this.
- There were already "journalists" shouting this morning "why hasn't Corbyn resigned yet?!", but I think keeping him in until after Brexit withdrawal goes through is a positive thing, as it means a new leader can have a fresh start on that have to plant their flag so much. Labour can either take heart of the fact that a lot of their policies were actually quite popular when put to voters this election, and use that as a platform, or they have can more in-fighting among the factions within. For them, it's pivotal they do unite, as if economists are right and Brexit smashes the economy, and those previously mentioned middle-classers get hit, then they can offer a viable alternative. We'll have to go through a bit of pain to get rid of them, I'm afraid!
- Unfortunately, this alternative is not the EU, as the remain suggestion has whimpered out, and you just know if they do suggest a soft Brexit style deal then the Conservatives will frame it as betraying leave voters again. But it's about framing, and actually having Brexit happen means the pressure is on the Conservatives, who now have a load of seats they've never had to deal with that can cause its own problems. The Conservatives will also redraw the lines to make victory easier, so backing electoral reform is probably right for Labour now considering the change in the country.
- Scotland is gone, and I hope it's a big blow for Johnson when it happens. He continually said that it would be Corbyn that breaks up the union, but it's hard to see how they don't get another referendum now, so he'll be the Prime Minister known as breaking up the Union!
- The Green Party got a 60% share increase in votes with 800k, I believe? That's great! I voted for Greens in 2017. How many seats has that got them? 1! SNP, with 48 seats, got about 1.2m! The saddest part of this election is that it is detrimental to the environment, and we'll likely have fracking in our countryside and foxes being hunted en-masse. There's going to be a lot of protesting over the next 5 years!

Can't find it right now but I saw earlier that if the electorate was entirely ages 18-24, 600 seats would have gone to Labour.

Concave wrote:

Can't find it right now but I saw earlier that if the electorate was entirely ages 18-24, 600 seats would have gone to Labour.

What I wonder is, how many young people voted. If they didn't show up again... sigh.

Concave wrote:

Can't find it right now but I saw earlier that if the electorate was entirely ages 18-24, 600 seats would have gone to Labour.

IMAGE(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ELrsIcHWkAAo-gX.jpg)

There's a definite divide, a disillusionment even, between the working class and the middle class. They see something completely foreign to one another. They blame each other for the problems in society. They're so vastly different with few intersecting issues.

I'm working class. Growing up we'd have been closer to the poverty line (for lack of a more precise categorization). Talking to those who are and have been comfortably middle class is sometimes infuriating, often mind boggling, and occasionally reality distorting. It can also seem as such for them, from their perspective.

I can only comment on what I experienced at the polling station, and between family, friends, work colleagues, acquaintances. Those who did not vote, within my circles, were predominantly of the younger generation. (I cannot be too critical having only decided to re-engage myself.) Those entering and exiting the polling station as I was there happened to be of a middle aged to elderly range. It's difficult to say what that means, though. I know youth who voted for the Conservatives, and more experienced folk who voted for Labour. Also, time of day per working hours and children.

I'm just thinking aloud, really, along similar conversational lines. People are throwing stereotypes around. Passing blame. Then again, the politicians based the elections, much like Brexit, around this, so it's hardly surprising.

So aftermath.

There is clearly one hell of a fight brewing in labour between Momentum and their supporters, and everybody else. I was going to say "anyone they consider Blairite", but frankly that's anyone that isn't momentum from their point of view. This is depressingly predictable to be honest, and just show how blind the far left of British politics are to anyone other than themselves and their own members. I think there is more than an element of self delusion in that, but there we go. Labour will never win another election so long as they hold power in the Labour Party.

Jeremy Corbyn's "We won the argument but not the election" - no you didn't Jeremy. You lost the argument on all fronts and you are too naive to see it. It's one of the primary reasons why nobody liked you. That and your willingness to tolerate those with extreme views. I totally agree there was a media agenda against you, but my word you bought that on yourself and did nothing to counter it.

Boris realised early on that the truth wasn't required to win, he just needed a simple message - "Get Brexit Done" and then move forward with whatever else was needed. Anything was superfluous while Labour continued to be utterly inept.

The most depressing thing in all of this is people's willingness to ignore outright lying. I think majority people are more than aware they are being lied to, they just don't care. That's a problem far beyond British politics at the moment, and is going to take a revolution to counter.

As for the Lib Dems - as soon as Swinson said she couldn't support any other party and definitely not Corbyn they were utterly sunk. Beyond stupid frankly.

The SNP will not get their second ref while the Conservatives are in charge. Sturgeon can go suck a duck on that front. It'll enrage the Scots (I have a lot of sympathy there) but will play very well south of the border to the Tory core support. That's all that matters.

Nigel got what he wanted. Depressing.

Sorbicol wrote:

There is clearly one hell of a fight brewing in labour between Momentum and their supporters, and everybody else. I was going to say "anyone they consider Blairite", but frankly that's anyone that isn't momentum from their point of view. This is depressingly predictable to be honest, and just show how blind the far left of British politics are to anyone other than themselves and their own members. I think there is more than an element of self delusion in that, but there we go. Labour will never win another election so long as they hold power in the Labour Party.

Like I said, there's a segment that doesn't really want to win (any kind of strategic moderation or compromise to achieve greater goals in the future is equivalent to capitulation) and would prefer to just look good losing.

The Irish Times view on Brexit day: Britain’s great leap backwards

And they’re gone. After three-and-a-half years of tortuous negotiations, political chaos and bitter social upheaval, the United Kingdom will formally leave the European Union at 11pm on Friday, signalling retreat from its most important alliance and casting itself into uncharted waters filled with hazards it must now contend with alone. For Brexiteers, the realisation of their political project is a time to rejoice. But for Ireland, the EU and the millions of British citizens, including so many young people, who cherish their European identity, this is above all a profoundly sad moment.

No state in the modern era has committed such a senseless act of self-harm. Brexit will make Britain poorer; the British government’s own analysis predicts as much. But the real impoverishment is far broader. Its citizens’ freedoms will be curtailed. Its voice in the international arena will be weakened. Its reputation as an open, forward-looking country will be diminished.

The Brexiteers’ argument all along has been that to leave the EU was to choose control over influence. But Britain’s influence was real – London shaped the course of European integration more than most, and the EU amplified its voice in the world – but the control it claims to regain on Friday night is fantasy.

The EU will continue to be its biggest trading partner and home to its closest allies. As a European state, it will be affected in one way or another by EU policies in almost every key area. But Britain will have no say over these decisions. Instead it has opted to luxuriate in the bogus comforts of a radical English nationalism that promises to fend off the forces that shape the modern world while retreating to an imagined past. Meanwhile, with Northern Ireland and Scotland being dragged out against their will, the multinational experiment that suddenly looks liable to implode is not the EU but the UK itself.

For Ireland, a Brexit negotiation process in which it had more power than its neighbour has been a useful reminder of the EU’s genius. The continent’s solidarity with Ireland over the past three years will not be forgotten, and our place at the heart of the EU is secure. But for the EU and for Ireland, Brexit is, inescapably, a terrible loss. The EU will be weaker without one of Europe’s traditional powers. And Ireland has lost a valuable ally at the EU table.

There are two kinds of EU states, a recent Danish foreign minister observed: small states and those who do not yet realise they are small states. On Friday night, two small states that signed up to the European project on the same day in January 1973 will go their separate ways, having come to very different conclusions about the values they stand for and their own place in the world. We may be growing apart, but our friendship can – must – endure.

I got a little misty near the end.

We’ll be back at some point I wouldn’t worry. Humbled and hopefully a lot less arrogant and a lot more welcoming.

I’m still European as far as I am concerned. Membership of the EU - or not - doesn’t change that.

Sorbicol wrote:

We’ll be back at some point I wouldn’t worry. Humbled and hopefully a lot less arrogant and a lot more welcoming.

I do sincerely hope so. And soon, too, or there might no longer be a UK -- just individual Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, and England.

I think today will mark the start of a national discovery that the UK is not as big and important as it thinks it is.

It is a total politician line that Brexit is "done" now. They are just starting the clock on the next round of negotiations.

It is just a sad situation. I feel bad for the UK people. I hope sometime soon the world will figure out how to counter the very effective propaganda machines.

LeapingGnome wrote:

It is just a sad situation. I feel bad for the UK people. I hope sometime soon the world will figure out how to counter the very effective propaganda machines.

Finland figured it out a few decades ago, so it is doable. If it's not too late for a given population.

Ode to Joy has been topping the charts in the UK. 54% of voters voted for parties offering a second referendum. I suspect this will be reserved in my lifetime.