With the situation in the world right now the UK wants closer alignment with the EU. I personally think this is a good idea, but I want us back in. The usual bunch Reece Mogg for instance are not happy. Would it be good for us to have closer ties with the EU?
Comments
"Not happy"? As far as I am concerned you can fuck the lot of them, and the horse they rode in on, repeatedly, with a syphilitic bull elephant and I would still be "not happy" that they had got what they deserved.
Sorry, that wasn't very purgatorial, but I needed it off my chest. The closer we cuddle up to the EU the better, and that includes rejoining.
The only thing that worries me about rejoining... would they want us back, after a decade of Brexiters busily burning bridges and most of the (allegedly) mainstream UK parties well to the right? Why would they want to readmit us if there's a risk of us voting to leave again in 20 years' time?
He and Reeves go on about economic 'growth' and then don't do anything to bring it about because of their extreme right wing ideological positions.
( And don't forget that the hard brexiters [no customs union, no single market] were the extreme right wing of the Tory party and this is now Labour policy! I'm not saying they are extreme right to be abusive - its a sadly accurate description of where they are on this)
As a very long term goal, I don't think it's necessarily a bad aim, but in the meantime I think politicians are better off working towards a closer relationship that stops short of reintegration.
Sure but if they don't start adopting clearly pro-European attitudes and saying they want reintegration and that Brexit was a terrible idea they won't begin to change those attitudes you see.
Labour say that Brexit divided families and they don’t want that to happen again. Never mind what’s good for the country.
The world situation in a sense doesn’t matter. We need closer alignment with the EU anyway.
Caissa queries: Where do we sign up and can they help us build a wall?
There is an irony behind the VE Day celebrations planned for next week, in the country that hailed the lunacy of Brexit as a massive step forward (The Will Of The People™). How the relative positions of Germany and the US have changed...
[tangent] Yes, but...[/tangent]
I don't trust his 'jokes'.
This Canadian will join you in composing the relevant referendum questions
It's a shame no one gave you some of the excellent cheese that's also available when you visited the states.
I am not ashamed that I voted for the UK to leave the EU. However I have never had a problem with the custom union and single market. My issue was always the political union.
Of course it would. A reasonably bright child of 10 can look at a map and see that our most obvious friends and allies should be those closest to us.
I'd caution against any talk of the UK being back in the EU. First, it will only rile the Brexit-at-any-price brigade - why poke the rattlesnake if you can detour around it? Second, after the 2016 vote and the chaotic negotiations after it the EU is hardly going to roll out the red carpet - you can guarantee that if the UK does go back in it will be on worse terms than we had before.
Yes it will be on worse terms but that is still better.
I don’t really care about the rattle snakes. We have to do what is best for us as a country. Also the rattlesnakes are becoming an endangered species.
As I said re joining is years off. We need closer alignment now. Anyone who wants to trade with the EU has to meet their standards anyway so that is already happening. Cutting the barriers to trade is important. It will smooth things out. It will also cut down on the illegal importation we know is happening. Our ability to check Lorries or boat cargo is still low. A good number of lorries are being sent to an inland check point. Smugglers are happy to risk it.
The political union gives members a voice over controlling the rules that govern the single market or customs union. I wouldn't welcome an arrangement that made the UK subject to rules that it didn't have a voice in formulating.
I say that as a reluctant remainer - I voted remain because I’d actually like the UK to be in EFTA, but wasn’t prepared to sign a blank ‘leave’ cheque.
But by that token my remain vote was literally no endorsement at all of the UK’s EU membership. It was at best ‘I think we should leave, but not at any price’
Which suggests a certain entrenching of polarisation if it comes off.
In regard to EU membership, I am of course fully in favour of the UK returning to the EU at the earliest opportunity, it was the height of stupidity to leave in the first place. I'm realistic enough to recognise that "earliest opportunity" isn't going to be in the next few years. That doesn't stop us making sure we're as close to the EU as possible, starting from tomorrow as far as I'm concerned - make sure all UK regulations align with the EU to remove regulatory barriers to trade which will also have the benefit of reducing the problem of the Irish border (we can accept the EU regulations, even if it would be better if we were still in the room helping to formulate them), don't move even further away from the EU (eg: stop talking about withdrawing from the few European institutions we're still part of), seek a treaty that regains customs union and single market membership.
I know the likes of Reform will shout loudly. But, they're a spent force despite the vote share they're likely to gain today in England. Even more so as they demonstrate their inability to engage positively with the political processes of council chambers and voters find they're paying for councillors who are unable to do their job.
Before we join the rest of Europe in the EU the UK has a lot of work to do to address the damage of Brexit - mostly damage to our own democracy, with the farcical 2016 vote being a symptom of our lack of proper constitutional systems (there's no way a referendum should be held for something that didn't get enough support in a general election for that to be part of government policy, and if a very clearly purely advisory mass opinion poll is needed then there needs to be time for all sides to develop a clear manifesto of what they would seek so that the question is clear rather than offering voters a "blank cheque" (thanks @betjemaniac for that phrase) allowing others to fill it in with something voters may not have supported).
1 - the EU has to still exist
2- the EU has to be willing to accept the UK back
Neither of these is a given and I would add a third caveat - what if the EU becomes dominated by far-right outfits like RN in France and AfD in Germany? Rejoining would look a lot less attractive then.
It seems to me like a self-fulfilling prophecy - if you go around making 'they won't have us back' noises then you don't encourage parties to make 'yes please have us back' noises (and actions) without which that reaccession won't happen. I think those attitudes are dangerous.
Polling has been consistent for rejoin for years and Reform are busy picking up low information voters who are disgusted and feel they've been shafted by Tories and Labour on top of their usual racist vote. It's not anti-EU sentiment getting out of hand - it's how badly Labour are governing.
It also annoys me to see people not prepared to fight for freedom of movement. There are many positive reasons for it but also are some people so secure they think the tabloid and social media fascists could never come for them or any of their friends and family members?
My bluesky feed has had trans people discussing fleeing the country and their options are very limited thanks to the fucking Brexiters. I see the same horrific right wing moral panickers setting their sights on autism and ADHD and countries like Canada, New Zealand and Australia won't allow autistic people to immigrate. Do some folk just think persecution could never happen to you and yours? We need freedom of movement back.
Yes there's the danger of more fascism in the EU but so long as there is freedom of movement at least if one country goes bad people have others to escape to. And if there's a European majority for fascism we're all screwed but lying down and dying about it before such a thing has happened isn't, in my opinion, the answer to it.
We already have to be rule takers without a say if we want to sell to the EU. It would be better to have a say and be part of the relevant institutions.
(On Louise’s trans point, the Republic of Ireland is an option.)
As for Reform. Well if people vote for them they are saying they happy to move from the NHS to an American style insurance model. I hope it never happens
He should beware of that thought. I knew at least one liberal who said that re Trump before his first win. They knew better than to say it before his second.
Indeed, hence the "almost".
All the families who would have been divided over Brexit already are. My Brexit-voting relatives have certainly not forgiven me for voting against it.
Of all the lies that Boris Johnson told, the biggest was his promise to 'Get Brexit done.' It will never be done. Or at least, not until we are full members of the EU again and even the lunatic fringe has admitted it was a bad idea.
@Ruth : I'm sure you do have good cheese in the US, but if any is exported over here it is unlikely to appear in my local supermarket. And we have plastic cheese of our own.
Minded to agree with all of that with the build (implicit in what you’ve written) that all referendums for constitutional change should have a confirmatory referendum after the negotiations.
Otherwise you risk a ‘mandate’ for x, with an eventual deal that looks nothing like your vote was based on offering. Back to blank cheques.
If you aren't going to do Leveson II don't bother with any of that, put EU membership out of your mind, simply concentrate on closer relationships and let trade take care of building an interest in preserving alignment.
He was not elected as a MEP to work with the EU. Those who voted for him and his party knew this
The UK along with France and Germany had was definitely at the top table by any reasonable measure.
But not by that of deluded brexiters who believed that meant always getting their own way.
Then he could have taken an abstentionist position and refused both salary and attendance. Did he do that? Did he fuck.
Because, as far as I'm concerned in terms of most aspects of the EU the UK couldn't have been further up the table. In relation to the various rules and regulations on goods and services the UK had at least as big a say as other major EU nations (eg: France and Germany), the proportion of members of the Commission from the UK was up with the other major nations. In many areas the UK had special status above that of other nations of comparable or greater size (measured both by population and GDP), opt outs of many rules and concessions on financial contributions.
I know there were some areas of EU membership which the Leave campaign jumped on as being particularly irksome and used to label the UK as being treated like being on a lower table. The big one being migration, with the UK accepting a higher proportion of people from the newer nations of the EU (Poland etc) than other longer standing members - though, this was (of course) a result of the decisions of the UK government and Parliament at the time to not enforce restrictions on migration from these nations that could have been enforced. Also, the data is very clear that allowing greater migration from these nations created jobs and boosted the UK economy, benefits which nations which enforced restrictions missed out on.
The tragic irony being that as one of the three biggest economies in the EU, we got our way far more often than not. And the policies that the Brexiters complained about most were suggested by Britain.
The British Empire: gone but not forgotten.
Absolute rubbish on both accounts.
Firstly as has been noted we were at the top table. In fact we had exceptions. We had one of the best positions in the EU.
Anyone sent from a country to the EU parliament signed up to represent their constituency in the EU. Farage and his crew did not do this. They didn’t turn up that often and when they did didn’t participate so didn’t represent their constituency. The only thing they cared about was dissing the EU and taking money to do it. They had responsibilities that they ignored because of their stance and ordinary people lost out. Money for nothing. Tax payer’s money at that. These are the facts. If you can show me they are not please do. I am willing to listen.
As a not completely irrelevant side note; in a functional country with an electoral commission worth the name, this kind of thing would have resulted in prosecutions:
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/may/03/eu-recovers-200000-from-ukip-meps-accused-of-misusing-funds
His focus was for the UK to leave the EU. Those who voted for his party knew this
They still had obligations that they did not fill. Things they were paid to do which they did not. You still haven’t come back on my question.