Can UK cancel Brexit and stay in EU?

I was commenting on how much hair I have(had) when compared to Gina.:joy:

I am starting to lose my hair over Brexit.
Too much on the brush.
We are also both really stressed.
We are not in such a difficult position as some, but the vision of a No Deal is frightening and TM seems as though she is on a race course, blinkered and ignoring the finishing line.

Do people really think the situation would be any different with Corbyn as PM?

May’s tactic seems to be to delay the vote until she believes that the prospect of no-deal will swing the result her way.

I don’t see the parliamentary arithmetic ever stacking up - while she might get Tory remainers on board I can’t see the ERG voting for it because they relish the prospect of no-deal, Labour won’t vote for it because they see it as a way to force an election, nor will the DUP, SNP or LibDems support May’s deal so I don’t think it can possibly get through.

As you say TM is blinkered, or seems to be - these aren’t the actions of someone who has the best interest of the nation at heart. If that were so she would see that her deal will never be acceptable to Parliament and would (or should) be working towards the path forward which does the least harm. Unfortunately when not blinkered by her own deal she still seems to be blinkered by “Brexit is the democratic will of the people and must not be derailed”

I don’t think people “get” no-deal - which is not surprising with phrases like “managed no-deal” or “WTO deal” being banded around to obfuscate the situation and make it sound like it is a workable plan.

No-deal is like someone who has decided that they are going to live off-grid and has arranged, on the 29th of March, to have their electricity, water, gas, phone, mobile and Internet disconnected. And for good measure has decided that they don’t trust banks so will go back entirely to cash transactions.

They have some half formed ideas about how to replace all of the things that they are throwing away - solar panels for electricity, log burner for cooking and heating, radio amateur’s licence for communications but haven’t actually set any of that up, nor swapped the 2-seater for the Landrover and trailer they’ll need to transport the logs.

Obviously they will be able to “live” - buy food at the supermarket with cash, ditto petrol and logs but it’s going to be cold and miserable living at their place for some time to come and it will never match up to what they had before.

I’m sure it would be different - differently disastrous, that is.

What is ‘the best interest of the nation’ - hard brexit, soft brexit, no brexit, a second referendum?

Is that rhetorical, Tim?

A tricky question sir.

Right now and in the short term - “no Brexit” but the legitimate concerns of those who voted Leave need to be addressed with improvements in school places, education & training, housing, health, full application of EU rules on migrant workers’ access to the UK labour market and a sober re-assessment of where we see our place in the European project. Otherwise there will be an enormous backlash which, itself, could have ramifications for years.

That isn’t going to happen, of course. We’d just get the no Brexit bit and there might be noises about the others but, I suspect, little concrete action.

Or, if we must leave, to do so but accept that we need to stay in the single market and remain in the EEA - either negotiated stand-alone or as an EFTA member.

Sadly I think we have lost too much political goodwill for that to be possible. It is by no means clear that the other EFTA members would accept our re-joining.

The anarchist in me is dangerously close to saying “fine, if you want no deal then go for it, come back when you want to talk about how Project Fear was not even close to how bad it is”.

However I think no-deal truly will be anarchy, going down that path really will be a question of “sow the wind, reap the whirlwind”

The sad thing about Brexit is we have wedged ourselves into a place where there is no good path out - all choices are awful.

The impasse at Westminster reflects how the UK voting people feel so I agree that the UK is stuck, the EU could help but it won’t until the last minute and only if no-deal looks likely.

Tim, you have always insisted that the EU has to give. They have made it clear that they have reached the point that they cannot pass without the other 27 countries suffering. Why do you think that the UK has the right to demand that? They can leave the club but do you think that it is right to vandalise it on the way out!

It would be very different because he would do what he believed in. (whether that was good or bad for the country is another matter) Mrs May has no standards, changes fro immovable positions without reason and is now acting as a spoilt child with no concern for anything other than her plan that nobody from either side of the debate seems to like. A political lightweight way out of her depth.

1 Like

I don’t think the EU has to give nor that the UK has the right to demand anything at all but the EU does have the power to make Brexit easier, it currently is choosing to make things difficult on the premise that this will discourage other member countries from leaving the ‘club’.

TM is a poor PM so no argument there, Corbyn is so wedded to his principles that he would also take the UK out of Europe regardless of the cost to the country and his party’s wishes.

Without a shadow of doubt - this is the way forward - it will be rocky but the best for the country.

Here’s a question, If the UK leaves without a deal and on the day after the French Fishing fleet cannot leave port to Enter British waters, Considering the current situation here in France do you think that they will blame Macron or the UK government?
Or like my wife just said, They will take no notice and just carry on and have a good scrap with the Brits.:laughing:

I think that you are wrong. The EU has to protect its internal market and giving Britain better terms than its own members would be unacceptable.

We’ll just have to see what happens David but one side has to give IF Brexit goes ahead as neither wants ‘no deal’.

I know it’s unfashionable but I admire Corbyn for both having principles and for sticking to them. Almost as much as I despise others like Boris Johnson and Michael Gove who put their own personal ambitions ahead of the country or their party. That does not mean that I think that Corbyn makes a good party leader or prospective PM but as I neither a member of the Labour Party nor able to vote in the U.K. its not really my concern.

They seem to be doing their bit.

All the talk of no deal since the last discussions are simply posturing.

“Sticks to principles” could be read as “political dinosaur”, especially in Corbyn’s case. Besides his principles aren’t as rigid, or as snow-white as the Labour publicity machine would have you believe.

Fairly minimal and designed to reduce the impact to the EU rather than to us. JRM was calling this a transition arrangement - it isn’t.

True but the EU has been clear that we are doing this to ourselves. To the extent they are prepared to mitigate damage it is to mitigate damage to the EU, not particularly the UK.

Will the EU erect any kind of border control between Ulster and Ireland in the event of a no deal I wonder. No mention of it today.