By the time some of you read this, May could be gone....

[Dominic]

Hey, I know. Let's have a referendum on whether we should have another referendum. At the same time, we could also have a second referendum. Then, if a majority decided they wanted another referendum, the second referendum would be counted. If however, a majority decided they didn't want one, then the second referendum would be deleted.

That way, nobody can claim it was undemocratic.

Brilliant!

[living the dream]

Dominic - you should be a politician, excellent solution to an unfathorable problem, if memory serves you only need 100,000 signatures on a petition for it to be heard in Parliament.

jimgward - I was voting remain but changed my position to Brexit, and the figure quoted ref Tory MPs was a figure from a Tory that was being interviewed by 5 live radio that I was listening to whilst in my car. Also my point being in my last post is that I an not some uneducated, racist, bigoted fool who can be influenced by a bunch of self serving politicians which the vast majority of remainers seem to think of those who voted for Brexit. My change of vote was based on a numbers of facts one being that the UK never signed up to this current EU format and more importantly I do not believe in a system where a group of Presidents can run a bloc of countries whose citizens never voted for them to be in those positions in the first place.

[WHL]

Hey, I know. Let's have a referendum on whether we should have another referendum. At the same time, we could also have a second referendum. Then, if a majority decided they wanted another referendum, the second referendum would be counted. If however, a majority decided they didn't want one, then the second referendum would be deleted.

That way, nobody can claim it was undemocratic.

Brilliant!

Can me have a vote on your Idea ?

[Jimgym]

I'm confused as to why the phrase "People's Vote" is being bandied around? Did the people not vote in the referendum? Can we have a referendum on whether it should be called the people's vote please? Actually, could we have best of 3?

[ApusApus]

As I've said before, I have lived in Cyprus for 13 years and hope to remain here for the rest of my life. Cyprus is my home. I have no plans to return to the UK; so why should I feel obliged to vote in UK General Elections, or the referendum, or any referendum come to that? Some of you chose to, that's up to you. I chose not to. As I've said before, my single vote would have no bearing whatsoever on the outcome - not one iota. That said, I am just as entitled to express an opinion on the nonsense which is Brexit, just as I am allowed to voice an opinion on Trump, Erdogan, Kim Jon Un or the politics of Cyprus.

Someone, a businessman, I knew around 50 years ago said to me that if he had a choice of employing someone who was intelligent, or someone who had commonsense, he would take the latter anyday. Some of the most successful entrepreneurs in life left school with no paper qualifications.

Strange that many of you who voted, or would have voted, to Remain have now changed your views and support Brexit. You changed your mind. That's what people do; change their views as time goes on and as they accumulate facts relating to their original decision. Interesting then that you say people shouldn't be allowed a second referendum.

A very recent Sky poll suggests that most people are now against Brexit and wish to remain: https://news.sky.com/story/majority-of- ... l-11555078 Why are so many of you keen not to allow them to re-vote in the light of information (about what leaving the EU really means) now available to them. Is it because you are afraid that the outcome of a second vote would not give you the outcome you crave?

You really don't get it, or give up do you?

You have children and/or grandchildren and their future in the EU is important to you because you have stated the advantages of this on numerous occasions yet you constantly try to justify your decision not to vote in the referendum when your vote could have made a difference and your children's future could have been safeguarded! Your lack of vote, and those like you, could have defined your children's future for decades to come …………… can you live with that?

On your latter point, nobody is afraid of a second vote! The 2 problems with this though are firstly, it is undemocratic as a vote is a vote, it's not the best of 3 or the best of 5, etc until we get the result that one of the sides wants! And secondly, if a second referendum were to be sanctioned then that would set a precedent and what's to stop the "losing" side demanding a third referendum, and the next "losing" side a fourth, and a fifth, and so on?

Do you really want the UK to be left in a state of economic and political limbo for years to come because that seems to be what you are proposing?


Shane

[Jimgward]

Dominic - you should be a politician, excellent solution to an unfathorable problem, if memory serves you only need 100,000 signatures on a petition for it to be heard in Parliament.

jimgward - I was voting remain but changed my position to Brexit, and the figure quoted ref Tory MPs was a figure from a Tory that was being interviewed by 5 live radio that I was listening to whilst in my car. Also my point being in my last post is that I an not some uneducated, racist, bigoted fool who can be influenced by a bunch of self serving politicians which the vast majority of remainers seem to think of those who voted for Brexit. My change of vote was based on a numbers of facts one being that the UK never signed up to this current EU format and more importantly I do not believe in a system where a group of Presidents can run a bloc of countries whose citizens never voted for them to be in those positions in the first place.

AS I quoted on the previous page;



Where are there unelected or non-democratic Presidents running blocks of countries? This perception is media driven - like the bendy bananas stories and thousands more... There are commissioners chosen by each country - unelected, but as are Civil Servants in the UK, with more power than most deserve

[Jim B]

Dominic - you should be a politician, excellent solution to an unfathorable problem, if memory serves you only need 100,000 signatures on a petition for it to be heard in Parliament.

jimgward - I was voting remain but changed my position to Brexit, and the figure quoted ref Tory MPs was a figure from a Tory that was being interviewed by 5 live radio that I was listening to whilst in my car. Also my point being in my last post is that I an not some uneducated, racist, bigoted fool who can be influenced by a bunch of self serving politicians which the vast majority of remainers seem to think of those who voted for Brexit. My change of vote was based on a numbers of facts one being that the UK never signed up to this current EU format and more importantly I do not believe in a system where a group of Presidents can run a bloc of countries whose citizens never voted for them to be in those positions in the first place.

So contrary to what I think was your first post about Brexit you did actually vote leave though implied by your wording that you voted remain and then changed your mind later? So you were never an actual Remainer ( that's a rhetorical question).

Jim

[outasite]

What all this has boiled down to is that the British Government and the EU, neither of whom have any idea of the concerns of the general population, have decided between themselves that we will remain almost in the EU but with no say on anything but obeying their dictats. I can see us re-applying in 2 years time tops. So what a waste of time this has all been.

[Jim B]

Morning Outasite (auto correct a pain at times)

There was a report issued by the U.N. this morning basically blaming the present government for the problems throughout the country since the Bankers crash and the introduction of austerity measures which apart from putting more money into the ultra rich pockets and not helping those that need help have done nothing.
It did state that a fifth of the population live below the poverty line; a new line that was decided by an all party committee recently. It also stated that although unemployment figures look good they are mainly due to low wages or zero hour contracts which the unemployed are forced to take or benefits are stopped.
Of course this report has been rejected out of hand by the Tories but they would ; wouldn't they?
My point is that generally things may not have been perfect but there were few food banks and kids going to school hungry; yes part of the country has been left behind in recent years but that's down to this government and nothing to do with the EU. There were good Tory governments in the past but most of this lot are just out to feather their own nest.

Jim

[Devil]

I have little feeling for the UN apart from contempt,

You have made many stupid remarks on this and other forums, but this one takes the biscuit. Whereas I can agree that not every decision made by the UN has been good, any more than every statement made by Theresa May has been good. However, I have worked for the UN over 20 odd years with commissions from two or three of the UN organisations and I firmly believe that my work has been accepted as beneficial to the world.

Below is a link to an Alphabetic Listing of UN System Organizations and Entities
The United Nations system is made up of the organizations established by the Charter of the United Nations.

https://www.unsystem.org/alpha

I invite you to skim through the titles and then repeat "I have little feeling for the UN apart from contempt", if you dare.

[Jimgward]

Hudswell never will accept negative critiques of the UK

The UK Is very good in terms of help to other countries but our help to the poorest in our society is going backwards rather than improving.

When did we need food banks before?

Austerity was not a necessity. Keynsian economics has been proven as the best way to come out of a recession.

As to Labour leaving the country in the mire. They did. Much todo with the worldwide recession. But they were also at fault. The debt has increased massively since then. The tories have made it worse.

[Devil]

If you have worked with the UN, you will have seen the waste, the privilege, the spending sprees, the parties...the culture...if you haven't then you went in blindfolded and indeed probably profited.

No, I bloody well haven't. The first work I did with them was on a committee evaluating ozone depletion, initially in developed countries and I was funded on presentation of documents by the Swiss Government. The only perk I had was that on long hauls I could fly business class. Some of the committee were from developing nations with a very small pro diem paid by a special fund of the UN and cattle class flights. After that, my job was to evaluate the use of ozone-depleting chemicals in developing countries. Initially, our committee met twice a year but, with the advent of the Internet, we reduced it to once a year in order to save money. It is true that our committee was welcomed by some of the developing countries with a good dinner, sometimes with entertainment. Again, the Swiss government paid my expenses against justification. And I can assure you that, being Swiss, my pro Diem was not generous.

After that, I was mandated by a United Nations fund to justify the expenses of developing nations in their fight to combat the emission of ozone-depleting chemicals. My travelling and other expenses were still funded by Switzerland but I received a pro diem, including office work, of, if I remember correctly, USD 1000 per day. A lot of this work involved discussions with top government officials including ministers, as well as the technical inspections.

I can say that all this work was done, either in committee for the first phase or as an official delegation with one colleague for part of the time, for the second. I did not have a UN passport but I did have special visas as an official in my own passport (this did make life easy at immigration!).

I cannot say that I ever witnessed any abuse by any of my colleagues. We just did our job, the same as we would've done any other job without any spending sprees, parties or whatever.

[Jim B]

Hudswell
Isn't it strange, everything that conflicts with your outlook is either corrupt, useless or fake. The report is quite damming and covered by many media outlets. The only ones in denial are the Tory Party and you of course.
I know little about the U.N. though the gentleman who produced the report, Professor Phillip Alston from New York University appears to be an honourable gentleman.

Austerity has only affected the poor, not the Bankers who caused the problem in the first place.


79https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-46236642

Jim

P.S. hundreds of links available

[Jim B]

Hudswell
Your problem is that you will not accept any criticism of the UK even when it is justified. Whether it was the fault of Labour (As you say) or the Bankers (As I say) is really immaterial as the weight of austerity falls on those who can least afford it and that was a decision made by this Tory government.
Instead of just dismissing the report out of hand it may be worth reading it ( or the salient points made and why) and then commenting instead of jumping in with both feet.

Jim

[WHL]

Captain Mainwaring's view of the World
UK = Do no wrong
Johnny Foreigner = Everything wrong with the World..

[Jimgward]

Back to the EU slant and Brexit - I can see that both sides have made mistakes in all this fiasco, but it seems incredible that the clock is now ticking fast and we are so far away from any form of agreement. It is unlikely May will be here in April - unless the plan is to let her take the blame - and it is increasingly unlikely this will pass parliament. The infighting in the Tory party is as bad as it is on here with all sides refusing to agree.

[jeba]

We do not know how the EU countries will react either, I suspect they would like us to throw it out to save them from doing the same. We assume the EU will agree,

Spain said they´d reject the draft agreement unless they get a veto on a trade agreement covering Gibraltar:https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... t-marriage

[Jim B]

It's payback time for some within the EU and for many in the WTO, Spain will be the first of many.
I can't see Russia giving the UK a warm welcome into the WTO and Moldova, yes little Moldova is going to make life difficult due to our wonderful Home Office refusing to issue visas to a Moldovian Trade Delegation..
Who was it who said it's going to be easy?

Jim

[Dominic]

Farage?

[Jimgward]

Fox also forecast great success with trade negotiations..... he travelled the world and came back....