Oh no!! Brexit not going quite as well as hoped

[FishFright]

It's almost impossible for the "centre parties" to get elected. Their votes are either swallowed by predominantly tory constituencies or predominantly labour constituencies. The biggest upset of recent years was the "red wall" turning blue thus indicating that change is happening.

However at the same time, the electoral boundaries are being redrawn to favour the Tories thus making it even harder for a pure labour win. If we had PR, the lib dems would be a far more dominant party along with the greens. As it is, their best hope for power is a liberal alliance with labour. They can take Tory seats that just won't vote labour (such as my local seat - Esher and Walton), where it would be impossible for Labour. Corbyn wouldn't countenance such an idea. Starmer looks like he might.

PR would ideal and give more viewpoints a voice, including the bad ones.

 

[BoldonLad]

It's almost impossible for the "centre parties" to get elected. Their votes are either swallowed by predominantly tory constituencies or predominantly labour constituencies. The biggest upset of recent years was the "red wall" turning blue thus indicating that change is happening.

However at the same time, the electoral boundaries are being redrawn to favour the Tories thus making it even harder for a pure labour win. If we had PR, the lib dems would be a far more dominant party along with the greens. As it is, their best hope for power is a liberal alliance with labour. They can take Tory seats that just won't vote labour (such as my local seat - Esher and Walton), where it would be impossible for Labour. Corbyn wouldn't countenance such an idea. Starmer looks like he might.

Isn't this a contradiction of what @FishFright said? If there really is a large number of voters "in the middle ground" then, is it not unreasonable to think, they would vote for a "centre" party, if offered such a choice, regardless of if they live in what has been a "polarised" constituency. Indeed, isn't this what actually happened to sweep Blair to power in his two landslide victories (ie, Blair presented himself a Centre option).

IMHO, the reason the LibDems fail to win such votes, is, they do not present themselves as a viable party which could form a Government, even if they won a majority.

 

[newfhouse]

The problem is with the extreme ends of the political spectrum. On the right you have the kind of Conservative who thinks anyone with different coloured skin should be strung up / sent back to where they came from, that poor people should jolly well sort themselves out so that rich people don't have to mollycoddle them and that the aim of life is to become rich regardless of who you step on along the way. On the left you have the Labour voter who thinks that all industry should be renationalised, all rich people should be taxes at 100% so that the money can be distributed across the population, private schools should be banned, wages should be capped etc.

Do either of these extremes actually exist in large enough numbers to be significant?

 

[Deleted member 49]

On the left you have the Labour voter who thinks that all industry should be renationalised, all rich people should be taxes at 100% so that the money can be distributed across the population, private schools should be banned, wages should be capped etc.

Where do I sign up ?

 

[BoldonLad]

Do either of these extremes actually exist in large enough numbers to be significant?

Well, it would appear there is at least one prospective member of one "extreme" on here

 

[newfhouse]

Well, it would appear there is at least one prospective member of one "extreme" on here

Go on…

 

[Rusty Nails]

Well, it would appear there is at least one prospective member of one "extreme" on here

For accuracy and avoidance of confusion I think we need a definition of the difference between "extreme", "far", "middle" and "centre" when talking about left and right political views. For some who are happy on the fence anything out of their touching distance is extreme.

 

[swansonj]

For accuracy and avoidance of confusion I think we need a definition of the difference between "extreme", "far", "middle" and "centre" when talking about left and right political views. For some who are happy on the fence anything out of their touching distance is extreme.

Good luck with that. A few weeks ago, the problem of the arbitrariness/relativism of classifying political views came up when Pale Rider said:

None of the above is hard right, although I can see it would look that way from those with an increasingly woke perspective.

I asked:

"Hard" is of course entirely subjective whether applied to left or right, it's all in the eye of the beholder. Just for fun, could you give us some examples of what would seem to you to be "hard" right views or policies?

But answer came there none.

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

''Time is running out to prove Brexit is not a historic failure.'' It's a headline in the Telegraph yesterday. Admittedly it's a comment piece and not front page news. I'm not a subscriber to the Telegraph so I haven't read it but, if anyone around here is, please let us know what it says.

 

[BoldonLad]

For accuracy and avoidance of confusion I think we need a definition of the difference between "extreme", "far", "middle" and "centre" when talking about left and right political views. For some who are happy on the fence anything out of their touching distance is extreme.

Yes, I would agree, these terms are meaningless, in rather the same way that "Working Class", "Middle Class", "rich", "poor", are also meaningless. they mean something different to each person.

 

[FishFright]

For accuracy and avoidance of confusion I think we need a definition of the difference between "extreme", "far", "middle" and "centre" when talking about left and right political views. For some who are happy on the fence anything out of their touching distance is extreme.

That's just quibbling for the sake of it , were you very bored ?

 

[mudsticks]

''Time is running out to prove Brexit is not a historic failure.'' It's a headline in the Telegraph yesterday. Admittedly it's a comment piece and not front page news. I'm not a subscriber to the Telegraph so I haven't read it but, if anyone around here is, please let us know what it says.

See all Business
COMMENT
Time is running out to prove Brexit is not a historic failure
It's been five years since the referendum. 2022 is the year reality needs to match the hype

BEN MARLOW
CHIEF CITY COMMENTATOR
4 January 2022 • 4:00pm
Ben Marlow
The Prime Minister had an inspiring message for everyone on New Year’s Eve: get vaccinated to help stop the spread of omicron. It should be everyone’s resolution for 2022, he said, although with 82.5pc of those aged 12 and over double-jabbed, and 59.3pc already topped up with a booster, it was not a rallying cry to divide the nation in “take back control” style.

Still, in the spirit of telling others what to do, here’s a new year’s pledge for Boris Johnson. Prove to the people of this country – both Brexiteers and Remainers – that Brexit isn’t destined to become a historic failure.

It’s been five long years since the shock referendum result and 12 full months since Britain burst free from the shackles of Brussels. Yet even some of the most ardent Brexiteers are beginning to reluctantly concede that life outside the EU has yet to live up to its billing. Lord Frost’s resignation from the Cabinet last month partly expressed that disappointment.





The Government too seems to have tacitly acknowledged such frustrations with a press release to mark the end of 2021 that promised “to build on Brexit achievements in 2022”. Coming just as several trade bodies warned that new customs checks would wreck imports from the bloc, with one predicting they would become “more expensive, less flexible and much slower”, it was comically bad timing.

According to No 10’s missive, among the “key successes” so far is “taking back control of our borders”, a boast not necessarily supported by the record number of Channel crossings in 2021 when arrivals tripled to more than 28,000, or the exodus of legal migrant EU workers that has left some industries facing a workforce crisis.


Still, if nothing else, surely we can all agree that when it comes to “axing red tape”, the return of the crown stamp on to the side of pint glasses counts as a significant victory over those pesky Brussels bureaucrats. Ditto removing the ban on selling in pounds and ounces.

It’s pretty weak stuff from the Downing Street spinners. Perhaps all those parties are catching up with them. What has happened to all the big free trade deals that were promised? In their search for benefits, officials are scraping the bottom of the barrel with such fury that they have tunnelled through to the antipodes.



The Prime Minister can talk all he likes about “landmark deals” with Australia and New Zealand but by the Government’s own admission, neither will move the dial when it comes to GDP or cheaper goods.

The pacts are supposed to “pave the way” for Britain’s entry to the £9 trillion Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, whose members include major economies such as Canada, Japan and Mexico. But membership of this big club remains aspirational for now and there are serious questions about the overall benefits to exporters given the physical distance between the UK and the Pacific region.

It has also been pointed out that the UK may be required to make the kind of compromises that Brexiteers persistently cited as one of the main reasons for leaving the EU.

The big prize remains an agreement with America but as the one-year anniversary of Joe Biden’s inauguration approaches, a transatlantic tie-up remains as far beyond our reach as ever. The unfortunate reality anyway is that for all the political hot air that they generate, most free-trade deals have very little impact owing to their limited scope.


But it’s not just that the benefits of Brexit have so far proved elusive. It’s worse than that. The initial impact, from chaos with customs checks and a heavy blow to business investment has been almost overwhelmingly negative – and things could get a lot worse.



Goods coming into Britain face a fresh avalanche of paperwork, threatening more supply chain dislocation and to overwhelm our ports. The Northern Ireland conundrum – which stumped Lord Frost and failed to merit a mention in the Prime Minister’s new year message – has been handed to Liz Truss, whose recent ascendency is better evidence of the Government’s weakness than her strengths. Food prices could spiral further after a year in which inflation had hit 5.2pc by the end of November.

For the time being, the Government still has the electorate on its side but only just perhaps. While a recent Ipsos Mori poll found just 24pc of the population favoured rejoining the EU, results of a separate survey for Opinium showed that 42pc of people who voted Leave in 2016 had a negative view of how Brexit had turned out so far.

Voters aren’t mugs. Ministers can’t keep dismissing the downsides as teething problems. Nor will the public continue to accept the jam tomorrow version of events. When Boris says the Government will go “further and faster” in 2022 to maximise the opportunities of Brexit, he should be held to it.



This is the year when reality should finally match all the hype, otherwise even the most staunch Brexiteers may be forced to question whether they will ever get what they wanted.
******

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

See all Business
COMMENT
Time is running out to prove Brexit is not a historic failure
It's been five years since the referendum. 2022 is the year reality needs to match the hype

BEN MARLOW
CHIEF CITY COMMENTATOR
4 January 2022 • 4:00pm
Ben Marlow
The Prime Minister had an inspiring message for everyone on New Year’s Eve: get vaccinated to help stop the spread of omicron. It should be everyone’s resolution for 2022, he said, although with 82.5pc of those aged 12 and over double-jabbed, and 59.3pc already topped up with a booster, it was not a rallying cry to divide the nation in “take back control” style.

Still, in the spirit of telling others what to do, here’s a new year’s pledge for Boris Johnson. Prove to the people of this country – both Brexiteers and Remainers – that Brexit isn’t destined to become a historic failure.

It’s been five long years since the shock referendum result and 12 full months since Britain burst free from the shackles of Brussels. Yet even some of the most ardent Brexiteers are beginning to reluctantly concede that life outside the EU has yet to live up to its billing. Lord Frost’s resignation from the Cabinet last month partly expressed that disappointment.





The Government too seems to have tacitly acknowledged such frustrations with a press release to mark the end of 2021 that promised “to build on Brexit achievements in 2022”. Coming just as several trade bodies warned that new customs checks would wreck imports from the bloc, with one predicting they would become “more expensive, less flexible and much slower”, it was comically bad timing.

According to No 10’s missive, among the “key successes” so far is “taking back control of our borders”, a boast not necessarily supported by the record number of Channel crossings in 2021 when arrivals tripled to more than 28,000, or the exodus of legal migrant EU workers that has left some industries facing a workforce crisis.


Still, if nothing else, surely we can all agree that when it comes to “axing red tape”, the return of the crown stamp on to the side of pint glasses counts as a significant victory over those pesky Brussels bureaucrats. Ditto removing the ban on selling in pounds and ounces.

It’s pretty weak stuff from the Downing Street spinners. Perhaps all those parties are catching up with them. What has happened to all the big free trade deals that were promised? In their search for benefits, officials are scraping the bottom of the barrel with such fury that they have tunnelled through to the antipodes.



The Prime Minister can talk all he likes about “landmark deals” with Australia and New Zealand but by the Government’s own admission, neither will move the dial when it comes to GDP or cheaper goods.

The pacts are supposed to “pave the way” for Britain’s entry to the £9 trillion Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, whose members include major economies such as Canada, Japan and Mexico. But membership of this big club remains aspirational for now and there are serious questions about the overall benefits to exporters given the physical distance between the UK and the Pacific region.

It has also been pointed out that the UK may be required to make the kind of compromises that Brexiteers persistently cited as one of the main reasons for leaving the EU.

The big prize remains an agreement with America but as the one-year anniversary of Joe Biden’s inauguration approaches, a transatlantic tie-up remains as far beyond our reach as ever. The unfortunate reality anyway is that for all the political hot air that they generate, most free-trade deals have very little impact owing to their limited scope.


But it’s not just that the benefits of Brexit have so far proved elusive. It’s worse than that. The initial impact, from chaos with customs checks and a heavy blow to business investment has been almost overwhelmingly negative – and things could get a lot worse.



Goods coming into Britain face a fresh avalanche of paperwork, threatening more supply chain dislocation and to overwhelm our ports. The Northern Ireland conundrum – which stumped Lord Frost and failed to merit a mention in the Prime Minister’s new year message – has been handed to Liz Truss, whose recent ascendency is better evidence of the Government’s weakness than her strengths. Food prices could spiral further after a year in which inflation had hit 5.2pc by the end of November.

For the time being, the Government still has the electorate on its side but only just perhaps. While a recent Ipsos Mori poll found just 24pc of the population favoured rejoining the EU, results of a separate survey for Opinium showed that 42pc of people who voted Leave in 2016 had a negative view of how Brexit had turned out so far.

Voters aren’t mugs. Ministers can’t keep dismissing the downsides as teething problems. Nor will the public continue to accept the jam tomorrow version of events. When Boris says the Government will go “further and faster” in 2022 to maximise the opportunities of Brexit, he should be held to it.



This is the year when reality should finally match all the hype, otherwise even the most staunch Brexiteers may be forced to question whether they will ever get what they wanted.
******

Thanks mudders, very helpful.

 

[Mugshot]

I haven't read it but, if anyone around here is, please let us know what it says.

I was hoping it would say if you're not starving, stop moaning, and my flag shagging mates down the pub will fight you if you don't say how great Brexit and Johnson are.

While a recent Ipsos Mori poll found just 24pc of the population favoured rejoining the EU

I believe this poll has been deleted by the head of Ipsos Mori, on account of it being utter codswallop.

 

[Fab Foodie]

That's just quibbling for the sake of it , were you very bored ?

Disagree , there are huge overlaps in peoples definitions and those overlaps are very much based on where you 'think' you stand on the continuum. As a quick example, the Democratic party is seen in the USA as a left wing party (almost commies in some Republican circles), in the UK it would be slightly right of centre like a moderate Conservative party. Nobody much in the UK would consider USA Democrats a party of the left.