I'm confused. Hammond talks as if he wants the UK to remain in the EU but Davis talks like we are out of everything but will get everything just because, delusion much. Do they even talk to each other? Davis can't get a deal that matches Hammond's views and Davis doesn't want a deal that keeps us in the EU. What the hell are they doing then?
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UK General Election 2017 |OT2| No Government is better than a bad Government
- Thread starter Jezbollah
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Welcome to Brexit!
JonathanEx
Member
Oh, remember the Theresa May doing the V sign at Dover that we wondered if it was the Sun? Paddy Power, which we should have also considered for patheticness.
You'd assume that the Conservative party will occupy the right of whatever is generally socially acceptable within the general population anyway. If demographics change, then you'd imagine they would follow them.
It could mean the Conservatives moving to the left over time though, idk
That's true with any party outside Labour and the Tories really
But yeah, them getting the 4th highest donations is pretty surprising
That's what I wondered too, but I think the implication is there either aren't as many "new" older Tory voters or they aren't switching to Tory at the rate they used to?
I imagine that wouldn't be too difficult to check, but given everything that's happened over the decade with immigration/UKIP/Brexit/2008 crash etc, there are probably quite a few anomalies in the trend lines which probably won't settle for at least another 10-15 years.
That's half the problem with the Brexit campaign - the press and politicians had been using the EU as a convenient distraction for so, while assuming nothing would ever come of it. Then the referendum comes along, and shockingly, lots of voters remember those lies and exaggerations.
That is mostly true, but the current generation that is slowly dying out are the babybommers. They are currently 50 to 70 years old and in many european countries the majority. Even if some middle age and young people get more conservative, the difference between new generations and old generations shouldnt be so lopsided against the young.
Of course, the birthrate shouldnt plummet any longer or old people still rule the votes.
Everybody in the party that secured the largest number of votes is just getting on with the job!
Spuck-uk
Banned
MrMysterio
Member
Self-quoting here to make sure UK people know that EU citizens fears of deportation are real, and why holding out on any statement about EU citizens' rights has, and will further deteriorate relationships between EU citizens and the UK.
Blanket statements from a few pages ago of "deportation will not happen" are ill-informed and cover up UK's shocking approach to deportation (of EU citizens and more shockingly non-EU citizens).
Kotetsu534
Member
While there's a lot of truth to what your saying here, it's worth remembering that Labour won every employment category except retired people (full-time workers? Labour) and high educational attainment predicted a Labour or Lib Dem vote (indeed the percentage of people working in our universities who lean Tory is in the single digits). I'm sure there was a chart in the FT that showed that even controlling for age educational attainment pulled people away from the Tories. What I mean is the divide isn't purely economic; there's something cultural in the Labour/Tory divide too, that also cuts along age lines.
That said, I think it might have been James Delingpole (who's pretty astute when not trolling) who asked in The Spectator what the Tories were offering a 30-something on 40 grand a year who wasn't anticipating a large inheritance. It was a good question. I work with several people in your position from 4 years ago - low incomes now, but very high likelihood of much more fairly soon, from home-owning families. People who definitely come from the top 20%. None voted Tory (and many expressed incredulity when I said I did, often while wondering if I was like their dad).
PJV3
Member
The leader is a busted flush, they're more interested in her job than brexit.
Didn't he play Paddy Ashdown in that TV drama about forming the coalition?For some reason I keep picturing Vince Cable as Donald Sumpter aka That Guy Who Is In Everything:
D
Deleted member 231381
Unconfirmed Member
Ipsos doing what I was talking about earlier on! I mean, they're still using class as occupation type, but given occupation type is also a rough predictor of what I called the third factor of class earlier (lifetime expected income, which is better predicted by education, but we'll make do), you can see divisions along this third factor inside the first and second factors (home ownership and retired/non-retired status, correlates of age).
Class is very much alive!
There's clearly a remain/soft and a hard leave bloc in the tory party.
Whichever wins will decide on soft or hard Brexit.
jimbobsmells
Member
Well I just came out of an interesting Brexit contingency meeting. We're assuming worst case - loss of passporting, will need to set up a legal entity in the EU. It surprised me the breadth of roles that will need to transition to that new legal entity. Yet to quantify how many FTE that will be affected in the UK, but it'll be in the hundreds for sure.
D
Deleted member 231381
Unconfirmed Member
I disagree. A class is a group of people with common interests and barriers to entry and exit. E.g., industrial workers were a class because stronger union laws benefited them all and allowed them to construct barriers to entry and exit. Classes do not *necessarily* mean poor, middle-class, rich, although for analytical purposes you can often group them that way.
What you are describing (up-and-comers - well-educated people at the beginning of their carers with good prospects but minimal assets) are a class that is (or can expect to be) well-off. However, the Conservatives still offered them very little. If you are one of that class (I probably am myself), you want: a car, a house, a stable job, good local schools if you're considering having kids, good transport links, and so on. The Conservatives offered functionally none of these. So even though this is a well-off class, that doesn't mean they have to vote Conservative because the well-off classes are just that - classes plural, not a single class - and don't all share common interests when the reasons they are well-off vary wildly (e.g., an up-and-comer is well-off because of their skills and education, a retiree is well-off because of housing wealth). In this case, their interests are at odds and accordingly they voted differently.
If you want another example of this, retail and manual labour often vote very differently, even though both are not especially well-off, because the nature of why they are not especially well-off is different.
The Conservatives aren't the party of the well-off classes, or at least, they are to a much lesser extent than they once were. Fundamentally, they're the party of the retired class. Nearly 6 in 10 Conservative voters was retired!
Theonik
Member
That is not entirely true. In truth, most people form their political leanings when they are young and keep them till they die. Though interests do change while people age. There is also factors of the size of demographics too. The current wave of conservatives is mostly baby boomers which are quite numerous and disproportional because of the second world war. They largely always leaned conservative. You can think of it like the system trying to pass a proverbial blue turd. Now the interesting thing is viewing how demographics are changing now. Old people live longer and will continue to do so in the future but there is less young people in general so millennials will eventually come to dominate politics for their children for much longer.
E: One should also not view politics as a vacuum though. 50s Tories don't have the same policies as 2010s Tories.
This is not entirely true. Some people might say the same for the LD for example. But parties like UKIP were able to change the political landscape quite a lot despite not winning elections. Greens have also pushed a lot of policies towards labour etc.
Good luck.
Just imagine how many businesses all over the city and the wider country are having similar conversations as we speak. Yet we have a government that talks out of one side of its mouth about a strong economy, growth, jobs, etc. whilst talking up everything that will jeopardise those things on the other.
What's that as a percentage of your overall workforce?
jimbobsmells
Member
Approximately 10% of UK headcount
Also a gov't that doesn't provide any guidance to make the transition less disruptive.
(though given that they don't know what they're doing, I'm not sure they're in the position to provide guidance).
In the small chance that they UK scraps the entire idea of Brexit, I'm wondering if businesses will hedge their bets and still opt to transition the part of their workforce from the UK. I suspect the EU will move to make Euro clearing happen inside Eurozone, where before the UK was able to fight off calls for this, after brexit I'm not sure others would trust the whole thing not to happen again.
Theonik
Member
This sort of discussion is happening everywhere across the country. You also touched on why the idea of turning the UK into a tax heaven to retain business doesn't really work. Companies are thinking of relocating or setting up business in the continent because they pretty much have to so tax incentives are a very inefficient and in some cases ineffective incentive to stay. The EU is also in a position and in its best interests to legislate any such advantage the UK tries to make for itself away.
Haven't you heard? Thersea May can be a bloody difficult women.
@Reuters
Soros says Britain nearing tipping point, may reverse Brexit https://t.co/3VsPtkVdPZ https://t.co/eSfUhUZdBD
Soros says Britain nearing tipping point, may reverse Brexit https://t.co/3VsPtkVdPZ https://t.co/eSfUhUZdBD
Huw_Dawson
Member
There are two scenarios where Brexit is overturned: Labour u-turns and decides they're the party of Remain, then wins the next GE, or there's a massive public sentiment shift that gives the Tories enough cover to abandon the project without their party descending into civil war.
There is a third option, which is that the government falls over and the LDs/SNP run amazing campaigns and no pro-Brexit party is able to form a government. But then you have abject chaos.
Theonik
Member
I think both of these are actually the same scenario in practice. Neither Labour nor the Conservatives will move against Brexit if it is what the people want but who gets to do the U-turn depends on whether the Conservatives implode first or not.
Even with the constitutional revisions you have the referendum at the end of the process. I don't think that changing a Constitution is an easy process in any of the countries who have constitution and it still can happen that at the end all or some of the changes not to be approved. Voting for Brexit was like voting for changing the Constitution without knowing what you exactly change.
Even countries who use the referendum as a direct democracy tool, like Switzerland, do it on specific issues, not on such a generic topic.
Huw_Dawson
Member
That's a good point, they're similar scenarios.
What is clear, to me, is that you have a situation where the Leave/Remain sentiment itself has not changed since 2016, but the strength of feeling is with the Leave side. So it's much harder to change course on Brexit now. I don't think you'd need too much of a sentiment change for Corbyn to change tack, as much of his vocal support base will follow him wherever he may go, but you'd need some seriously damning stats or a weakening of the strength of feeling for the Tories to change track.
Hope Quiche enjoyed seeing Sister Act
Apparently that Handel / Ossoff congressional race in the USA has had $60M spent on it, I don't think we have total spending for the 2017 election yet but that is more than any other British election ever. It is £10M more than 2015 and £5M more than the campaign with the most spending ever which was 2005. The Democrats spent more on this than Labour spent in the 2010 and 2015 general elections put together.
That third option isn't going to happen
Whats more realistic is that after another GE, Labour need LD or SNP support to form government and 'reluctantly' accept the need to remain as a condition of forming a coalition government.
If that happened it would probably go a long way to redeeming the Lib Dems in the eyes of young people too
Theonik
Member
UK has a national spend cap of £19m and per seat gaps that depend on each seat. Wasting massive sums of money on election only benefits the wealthy and advertisers in practice. If it were up to me the cap would be even lower and campaigns would be financed by the state for parties that can break 5% of the national vote.
Miles Quaritch
Member
Soros huh? How many cheques will he be sending out this time?
Royal_Phalanx
Member
Labour is a weird coalition of young liberal voters and traditional working classes (some even came from UKIP for some reason). Following the pledges made on the platform is going to be difficult because of the contradictory nature of the EU policy. Leave the single market but keep the same benefits anyway? What?
I don't know what's more laughable about the 57% of the population favoring Remain in the latest poll;
- That this government continues marching towards the abyss with this knowledge, their majority evaporated, muttering 'Nothing has changed' over and over to itself.
OR
- 43% of the electorate still think that Brexit is a good idea.
- That this government continues marching towards the abyss with this knowledge, their majority evaporated, muttering 'Nothing has changed' over and over to itself.
OR
- 43% of the electorate still think that Brexit is a good idea.
Huw_Dawson
Member
Sauce?
Kotetsu534
Member
You're right, but generally when social class is referred to its the latter distinction that's meant, while a slosh of prejudice against manual jobs depending on the source. I wish every writer took such a nuanced approach, though.
Yes. This leads the irony that the biggest policy benefit to this "well-off" class was proposed by the supposedly arch-leftist Corbyn (writing off all student debt). Irony and politics are never far away.
Could you expand on this? I'm not familiar with a long-standing voting split along these lines. Would like to know about it.
And that's why the Tories must realise their offer, and their understanding of the electorate, has gone badly awry, or they will lose the next election. Winning via the retired class is just about the most boring election strategy ever conceived, no basis on which to govern for the future, and inevitably damages your young, who won't quickly forgive you.
Miles Quaritch
Member
I think we just need to stop talking Brexit down.
It was a few pages back or in the Brexit thread, but struggling to find it. Survation, I think.
That's happened regardless
nelsonroyale
Member
I don't exactly know how it is in England, but that is stupid fucking comment. Certainly, in Scotland the Greens have been responsible for calling out SNP on quite a few issues, and generably been more progressive and actually articulating a more coherent long term vision.
Royal_Phalanx: I am sure many of those who came from UKIP, probably originally voted Labour. Also, many of those young people wouldn't characterise themselves as liberals.
Coriolanus
Banned
you've already done that whether you reverse it or not. Reversing it would mean that you'd stop humiliating yourselves, tho.
Theonik
Member
England doesn't have its own parliament so the only platform the Greens have in England is their sole seat in Westminster and on the local level. In reality though and that's true of the Greens regardless of your opinion of them and I actually used to agree with a lot of their policies, they are not a serious party looking to govern. Having said that, voting for them does incentivise other parties to look at their policies and try and win you over which is overall a win.
Dirtyshubb
Member
Yep, as unlikely as it is I hope most of the country realise now how fucked it all is and public sentiment changes and allows us to say "you know what, we will take you up on that deal to cancel it, sorry".
GamingKaiju
Member
I hate to agree but it is true
We've fucked up the sooner we swallow that bitter pill the faster people will move on. Agree to ending the rebates & opt outs but if we could keep the £ then I'll be happy.
While many will celebrate that, even back in the EU nobody would trust the UK for the foreseeable future. Generally all this incident has highlighted is that the UK is untrustworthy.
Huw_Dawson
Member
At the moment the government should negotiate a nice soft Brexit that does little economic harm. Then the various parties can campaign on "what's next" at the next election - maybe the LDs campaign on re-joining the EU political structures, maybe Labour campaigns on modifying the deal, maybe the Tories campaign on breaking away further.
The reason why the Tories on the right of their party want a clean break is to avoid the long political process of disentanglement and win quickly, which gives too much time for progressive pro-EU voices over a number of years to change voter minds.
The very obvious threat, if you're a right winger, is that we're in a transitional arrangement for five years and right in the middle of that you have a GE won by a pro-EU party. They waltz back into the EU as a full member (maybe *gasp* adopting the Euro) and the concept of Brexit is forever doomed.
Once we're out, it's a long process to rejoin, and it's a process that becomes more and more difficult as we sit in the Atlantic trying to ramp up trade with distant partners.
The reason why the Tories on the right of their party want a clean break is to avoid the long political process of disentanglement and win quickly, which gives too much time for progressive pro-EU voices over a number of years to change voter minds.
The very obvious threat, if you're a right winger, is that we're in a transitional arrangement for five years and right in the middle of that you have a GE won by a pro-EU party. They waltz back into the EU as a full member (maybe *gasp* adopting the Euro) and the concept of Brexit is forever doomed.
Once we're out, it's a long process to rejoin, and it's a process that becomes more and more difficult as we sit in the Atlantic trying to ramp up trade with distant partners.
D
Deleted member 231381
Unconfirmed Member
Adopting the Euro would be a spectacularly bad idea.
Pyramid head
Banned
I actually had to stifle a chuckle while reading this at my desk. The fact that the referendum happened in the first place already rendered this country a global laughing stock. With the passing of each day since, as it becomes ever clearer that this we're populated by, and ruled over by mentally substandard fools who have never known for a even a moment what they're doing or what they want, the sniggering is only getting louder.
TBH, I reckon that an open admission that this was all a massive, embarrassing mistake followed by a request to call the whole shitshow off would garner more respect than blinding stumbling on as we are. From everyone except racists and lunatics anyway.
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