Thanks for the warning - I won’t watch it then. 
1 Like
Haha 
Just reading Chris Grey’s latest. As @billybutcher already mentioned, it focuses mainly on how brexit has made it’s way back up the UK political agenda since the truss-crash. As for Labour’s policy, Grey advocates ‘some form of single market membership and a customs treaty’ short of EU membership - precisely what Labour policy was before Starmer took over!
He also missed an opportunity, when discussing the ‘Singapore on Thames’ brexiter dream of a fee-market-free-for-all, of pointing out that in reality Singapore is just the opposite - it is a very big state economy. Almost all the land in Singapore is government-owned, as is 85% of housing; 22% of national output is from nationalised industries. The economy they point to as a model of success, is in fact almost the exact opposite of the economy they advocate.
1 Like
Not my usual reading material but as the topic title suggests… a worm turning
1 Like
“Tories are coked up posh boys who think they can run the entire planet.”
Quite.
2 Likes
It is I suppose a good thing that there is a gradually emerging if grudging acceptance that maybe it was not such a good idea after all. However what I am waiting for is a full-throated acknowledgment that the consequences were well-established before the vote and that the whole thing was a bone-headed folly promoted by lies, populism and Putin.
I won’t be holding my breath.
It was all so tediously predictable.
1 Like
Yes, I was delighted to see Chris agreed with me 
he’s always a good read. IMO as wider discontent grows we just need to watch the anti Brexit momentum grow too… Though IMO the debate will just look like Groundhog Day until Labour have the cojones to put forward a radical damage limitation plan, including freedom of movement, ECJ, etc. and to fight for it.
No, they certainly aren’t, yet. I remember the unfounded bullshit during the negotiations about the EU wanting to “punish” the UK for leaving, and I don’t think there is currently anything more malevolent than exasperation on the part of the EU.
However, if the UK does try and reopen negotiations, whenever that may or may not happen, I’m not so sure that there won’t be a backlash from the 27 (maybe excluding Ireland) for all the merde the UK has put the EU through for six years (and counting).
On the other side politicions getting people in the UK to understand that a new deal, much worse than the original deal but better than the current deal is the way forward. 
Meanwhile all the guilty parties, Farage, Mogg, ERG members, etc. will exonerate themselves by claiming that Brexit just wasn’t executed “properly”
2 Likes
The Telegraph, no less 
Incredibly, the Tories have squandered another year of Brexit
Blame for Brexit’s failure cannot be attributed to ‘mutinous Remainers’
Ben Marlow 23 November 2022 • 6:00am
Chief City Commentator
It’s not often you get to see the penny drop live on air but that’s precisely what viewers of GB News were treated to this week. Hapless stand-in presenter Martin Daubney triumphantly prepared to reveal news of ongoing public support for Brexit following an exclusive Twitter poll conducted by the channel.
Instead, as a realisation dawned on the former editor of lads’ mag Loaded and anti-woke crusader that 55pc of respondents would in fact now vote against Brexit, he appeared to momentarily lose the power of speech.
The results would have been a particularly bitter pill for him to swallow given his previous exploits first as a Brexit Party Member of the European Parliament for the East Midlands from 2019 to 2020, then as deputy leader of the Reclaim Party until August this year.
Of course, it is only one poll but with Brexit, two things seem increasingly clear: first, that appetite for the project is waning even among some formerly enthusiastic Brexiteers; and two, that the Tories still have next-to-no answers when it comes to making it work.
As we began the new year, I challenged our-then Prime Minister to prove to the people of this country – both Brexiteers and Remainers – that Brexit isn’t destined to become a historic failure. The Government had a year to fix Brexit otherwise it would have to be considered a failure, I suggested.
With Christmas suddenly looming, it only seems right to ask how far we’ve come since then, the answer to which is very obviously nowhere, despite a Cabinet pledge to “go further and faster” to maximise the opportunities of Brexit. Incredibly, it is now more than six years since the referendum and nearly two since our actual EU exit. Yet, there has been zero progress on any of the defining issues whether it is immigration, trade, red tape, or labour shortages. Life outside the EU simply hasn’t lived up to its billing.
Yet, what is most extraordinary about the whole situation is that blame for its failure cannot be attributed to “mutinous Remainers”. Brexit has turned out to be the dampest of squibs because this Government has repeatedly failed to deliver the benefits it insisted would be forthcoming. It is mostly down to woeful execution on the part of incompetent and politically impotent ministers.
The polling has been getting steadily worse for Brexit as this malaise has festered through 2022. Last week, a survey from YouGov suggests that public support for Brexit currently stands at an all-time low. Just 32pc of Britons believe it was right to leave and 56pc think it was wrong, the largest gap yet.
Further criticism has come from what Brexiteers might dismiss as the Remainer establishment. Blaming Britain’s departure from the EU for permanently damaging the UK economy, former Bank of England policymaker Michael Saunders claimed that Brexit was the ultimate reason for a fresh round of austerity.
Yet dissent is emerging inside the tent too, making it much harder to ignore. A free trade bonanza has not been unleashed, and even the flagship trade deal Britain struck with Australia has been rubbished by the Brexiteer former cabinet minister George Eustice.
Eustice criticised the agreement as not “a very good deal” for the UK because the Government “gave away far too much for far too little in return”.
Meanwhile, even Treasury minister Andrew Griffith found himself unable to name a single benefit in the Commons this week, having boasted that Brexit is “already delivering”.
And now, the Chancellor of all people, has dared to poke his head above the parapet only for it to be shot off by hardline Brexiteer MPs in the European Research Group, peddling a tired betrayal narrative.
Having admitted last week that Brexit had led to trade barriers, and that removing them would probably boost growth (a not-unreasonable assertion) Jeremy Hunt is widely suspected of being the source of a weekend story that claimed the Government is seeking a “Swiss-style” relationship with Brussels.
Yet, because such an arrangement could lead to a perceived loss of sovereignty through so-called alignment on food and agriculture standards, at least temporarily, it was promptly shot down by the Prime Minister at a conference hosted by business lobby group the CBI.
The UK will have to improve trade with Europe at some point, but if a Swiss deal is out of the question, then what is that Brexiteers want? Will the Tories continue to be beholden to ERG MPs? It may well be “the defining issue of why we are in politics,” as one was quoted as saying this week but many of them will almost certainly lose their seats at the next election.
The truth is that Tories are still riven with division, which makes it impossible to discuss anything that might improve the situation for business. And, even if they weren’t hopelessly divided, the elephant in the room needs to first be acknowledged for there to be any chance of a resolution.
Meanwhile, having spotted exactly where this is heading, Keir Starmer is outflanking the Government already so that soon he will be able to present himself as the only man who can do a better deal.
Yes I agree, have you seen the new Gov Petition if it reaches 100,000 they have to discuss it in Parliament.
The government response makes interesting reading.
Regards
Nick
2 Likes
P)lease point me to a single one of these petitions that has achieved anything.
Either the government wants to do something/put something into law or you can go whistle (even MPs rarely get private member’s bills through).
3 Likes
You’re right of course, but anything that makes the fainthearted opposition summon up a bit of righteous courage can’t be bad.
2 Likes
This is the link
Currently, a petition to ban the sale of disposable barbecues has more votes
1 Like
Another worthy cause
Meanwhile Labour keeps digging…
At least Macron, more than 50% of the French population voted for him, where Rushi was voted in by 380 people (now that is democracy…not)
1 Like
I thought that re media coverage then thought it was wishful thinking. Cant understand Starmer’s take on it. He and the ace David Lammy were devastated.
well said