OT. The futures Bright, the Futures Brexit!!!

[MadAmster]

I'm very happy to be just 4 months short of 70, mortgage paid off and enjoying a busy life after 43 years of working and then retiring at 60. I do not envy today's U35s one bit.

[swaledale]

Well it seems one of the fundamental reasons why certain less than astute voters were in favour of Brexit has failed, with the immigration figures out this week! It must blow their little minds to see that white European migration is down, only to be replaced by non EU migrants!!

Still I guess if they are happy to see the economy continue to tank and stagnate and start caring for their own old folks, they will be happy if some of the wacky ideas being circulated by all parties except the Lib Dems come to fruition.

As a footnote, given the Rawanda scheme is for 200 asylum seekers, all the foot stamping over the ECHR is actually a lot of noise over nothing, but then maybe there is an ulterior motive behind this??

[Andy_Faber]

Well it seems one of the fundamental reasons why certain less than astute voters were in favour of Brexit has failed

I’m sure (in fact I think you’ve said it yourself) that protesting about what you believe in is an ongoing thing, the ‘less astute’ millions haven’t changed their minds and will continue to protest whenever given an opportunity, and both the parties with any chance of power will pander (or pretend to) to those protesting voices.

[ramAnag]

I’d suggest that two questions that should concern us are, how much damage is Reform UK likely to do to what remains of the Tory vote and how ‘toxic’ is the next General Election likely to become as a result of the ‘contributions’ made by Richard Tice, his partner Isabel Oakeshott, and Farage (again)...the slightly more ‘articulate’ faces of the far Right? Three hideously dangerous and destabilising individuals...imo.

[MadAmster]

Well, we Cloggies got an election result to shiver yer timbers.... until you look further than which party is the largest. The PVV, which can't really be referred to as a party git just over 24% of the vote and, as we have PR, also just over 24% of the seats. Why not a party? Wilders IS the PVV. He is the one and only member. Nobody else is allowed to join. He decides policy. Nobody can argue against him as they aren't members of the party.

I'm not expecting a huge leap to the far right, as far as Government policy is concerned. He needs to form a coalition in order to form a government/cabinet. His most far right policies from the manifesto were...
1. Banning the Koran
2. Close all Mosques
3. Ban the hijab, burkha etc from being worn in public buildings (he has previously suggested a tax on them)
4. Limiting immigration

He will drop 1, 2 and 3 during coalition negotiations as no other party will agree to them. #4 has legs as just about every other party had reducing/stopping immigration in their own manifestos.

He also had Nexit and dropping the Euro in order to return to the Guilder. IMO he will drop both of those policies as well.

That leaves his socio-economic policies to look at. Most of those are most definitely left wing. That will make it difficult to come to an agreement with the right of centre parties with whom he could form a majority government. His PVV has 37 of the 150 seats and needs 76 to gain a majority. NSC with 20 seats is touted as being a possible partner. However, their leader's #1 policy is a complete overhaul of how government works. He wants Ministers to be professionals in the field of whatever Ministry they lead rather than being a political beast. For instance, an economist as Finance Minster. An education specialist as Education Minister etc. There other wide ranging reforms he wants as well. If those aren't on the table he'll step away. BBB, 7 seats, will require far reaching changes to the way farmers are currently being treated and will probably get those guarantees. We are now at 61 seats, 15 short of the required number. There's a handful of other right wing parties with a few seats each but they'd all want Minister's posts and part of their agenda to be in any plans and we could well finish up with as many as 7 or 8 parties in the coalition. IMO, that's unworkable.

There is another option. The VVD, 24 seats, has already said that they consider losing 10 seats at the election a defeat and it wouldn't be honouring the voters' choice if they were to remain in Government, the last 12 years, the PM was Rutte, VVD... What the VVD has aid is they won't join the government but they will vote with the PVV on "sensible" policies. That would certainly rule out numbers 1, 2 and 3 above as being a policy they'd back. They would back reducing immigration as that was also one of the policies in their manifesto. The crunch is in socio-economic policies. As I said, on those matters, the PVV is left wing and the VVD is right wing, neo liberal, conservative on those matters.

Getting a working coalition government is going to be difficult, very much so and my expectation is that coalition negotiations will fail and we will see a new election in March or April of 2024.

Until such time as the negotiations are finalised, the outgoing cabinet remains in situ and Rutte is, against the will of the majority of people, still Prime Minister. The previous election (2021) saw coalition negotiations take 299 days...

[Andy_Faber]

Well, we Cloggies got an election result to shiver yer timbers.... until you look further than which party is the largest. The PVV, which can't really be referred to as a party git just over 24% of the vote and, as we have PR, also just over 24% of the seats. Why not a party? Wilders IS the PVV. He is the one and only member. Nobody else is allowed to join. He decides policy. Nobody can argue against him as they aren't members of the party.

I'm not expecting a huge leap to the far right, as far as Government policy is concerned. He needs to form a coalition in order to form a government/cabinet. His most far right policies from the manifesto were...
1. Banning the Koran
2. Close all Mosques
3. Ban the hijab, burkha etc from being worn in public buildings (he has previously suggested a tax on them)
4. Limiting immigration

He will drop 1, 2 and 3 during coalition negotiations as no other party will agree to them. #4 has legs as just about every other party had reducing/stopping immigration in their own manifestos.

He also had Nexit and dropping the Euro in order to return to the Guilder. IMO he will drop both of those policies as well.

That leaves his socio-economic policies to look at. Most of those are most definitely left wing. That will make it difficult to come to an agreement with the right of centre parties with whom he could form a majority government. His PVV has 37 of the 150 seats and needs 76 to gain a majority. NSC with 20 seats is touted as being a possible partner. However, their leader's #1 policy is a complete overhaul of how government works. He wants Ministers to be professionals in the field of whatever Ministry they lead rather than being a political beast. For instance, an economist as Finance Minster. An education specialist as Education Minister etc. There other wide ranging reforms he wants as well. If those aren't on the table he'll step away. BBB, 7 seats, will require far reaching changes to the way farmers are currently being treated and will probably get those guarantees. We are now at 61 seats, 15 short of the required number. There's a handful of other right wing parties with a few seats each but they'd all want Minister's posts and part of their agenda to be in any plans and we could well finish up with as many as 7 or 8 parties in the coalition. IMO, that's unworkable.

There is another option. The VVD, 24 seats, has already said that they consider losing 10 seats at the election a defeat and it wouldn't be honouring the voters' choice if they were to remain in Government, the last 12 years, the PM was Rutte, VVD... What the VVD has aid is they won't join the government but they will vote with the PVV on "sensible" policies. That would certainly rule out numbers 1, 2 and 3 above as being a policy they'd back. They would back reducing immigration as that was also one of the policies in their manifesto. The crunch is in socio-economic policies. As I said, on those matters, the PVV is left wing and the VVD is right wing, neo liberal, conservative on those matters.

Getting a working coalition government is going to be difficult, very much so and my expectation is that coalition negotiations will fail and we will see a new election in March or April of 2024.

Until such time as the negotiations are finalised, the outgoing cabinet remains in situ and Rutte is, against the will of the majority of people, still Prime Minister. The previous election (2021) saw coalition negotiations take 299 days...

Thank God for first past the post!

[ramAnag]

Thank God for first past the post!

Lol...makes you wonder! Always good to see an intelligent first hand response (MA). Certain news coverage within the UK (Sky) made it sound as if the Dutch were creating a Nazi second coming whereas the truth is that over 75% of the Dutch electorate appear to have little or no time for Wilders. Probably much the same as Farage over here.

[Geoff Parkstone]

Well, we Cloggies got an election result to shiver yer timbers.... until you look further than which party is the largest. The PVV, which can't really be referred to as a party git just over 24% of the vote and, as we have PR, also just over 24% of the seats. Why not a party? Wilders IS the PVV. He is the one and only member. Nobody else is allowed to join. He decides policy. Nobody can argue against him as they aren't members of the party.

I'm not expecting a huge leap to the far right, as far as Government policy is concerned. He needs to form a coalition in order to form a government/cabinet. His most far right policies from the manifesto were...
1. Banning the Koran
2. Close all Mosques
3. Ban the hijab, burkha etc from being worn in public buildings (he has previously suggested a tax on them)
4. Limiting immigration

He will drop 1, 2 and 3 during coalition negotiations as no other party will agree to them. #4 has legs as just about every other party had reducing/stopping immigration in their own manifestos.

He also had Nexit and dropping the Euro in order to return to the Guilder. IMO he will drop both of those policies as well.

That leaves his socio-economic policies to look at. Most of those are most definitely left wing. That will make it difficult to come to an agreement with the right of centre parties with whom he could form a majority government. His PVV has 37 of the 150 seats and needs 76 to gain a majority. NSC with 20 seats is touted as being a possible partner. However, their leader's #1 policy is a complete overhaul of how government works. He wants Ministers to be professionals in the field of whatever Ministry they lead rather than being a political beast. For instance, an economist as Finance Minster. An education specialist as Education Minister etc. There other wide ranging reforms he wants as well. If those aren't on the table he'll step away. BBB, 7 seats, will require far reaching changes to the way farmers are currently being treated and will probably get those guarantees. We are now at 61 seats, 15 short of the required number. There's a handful of other right wing parties with a few seats each but they'd all want Minister's posts and part of their agenda to be in any plans and we could well finish up with as many as 7 or 8 parties in the coalition. IMO, that's unworkable.

There is another option. The VVD, 24 seats, has already said that they consider losing 10 seats at the election a defeat and it wouldn't be honouring the voters' choice if they were to remain in Government, the last 12 years, the PM was Rutte, VVD... What the VVD has aid is they won't join the government but they will vote with the PVV on "sensible" policies. That would certainly rule out numbers 1, 2 and 3 above as being a policy they'd back. They would back reducing immigration as that was also one of the policies in their manifesto. The crunch is in socio-economic policies. As I said, on those matters, the PVV is left wing and the VVD is right wing, neo liberal, conservative on those matters.

Getting a working coalition government is going to be difficult, very much so and my expectation is that coalition negotiations will fail and we will see a new election in March or April of 2024.

Until such time as the negotiations are finalised, the outgoing cabinet remains in situ and Rutte is, against the will of the majority of people, still Prime Minister. The previous election (2021) saw coalition negotiations take 299 days...

This is the problem with the open horseshoe version of proportional representation.

[swaledale]

I’m sure (in fact I think you’ve said it yourself) that protesting about what you believe in is an ongoing thing, the ‘less astute’ millions haven’t changed their minds and will continue to protest whenever given an opportunity, and both the parties with any chance of power will pander (or pretend to) to those protesting voices.

There are certainly many millions who ahve changed their minds, those who voted for leave on the basis there would be more funding for the NHS for instance and there is much regret amongst the sentient Brexit voters that what they voted for was based on promises that in reality could never be achieved. I have to admit, I can't help saying to them, "But that was obvious at the time and just a little research would have shown you that"

Only last week I was talking to a friend of mine, who was talking *******s in the theme of "The reason the government has been so bad is that under the EU they didn't ahve to govern as it was all dictated by the EU" Now the guy isn't thick by any means, but that statement isn't even close to the truth. Its only my tolerance that keeps him as a friend.

The dancing around the question that Starmer and Labour are doing, is for 2 main reasons, they know that any suggestion of rowing back even parts of Brexit will be an attack line in the right wing media - The Fail, The Expresslies and Torygraph would have a field day. Sadly even vaguely sentient people still lap up the bull**** these papers pump out - despite the Fail in particular contradicting itself often in the same week but often in the same month.

The other reason of course is to avoid stirring the ire of some of those voters (the less than astute) in some of the so called "red wall" seats, whose lives are desperate, mainly due to 13 plus years of failed Tory government, but who believe that the EU is the reason.

Brexit supporters want to keep up the pretence that Brexit isn't the issue, it wasn't implemented properly. Fortunately the dial is turning towards the realisation that Brexit was the UK shooting itself in the foot. The move towards better elations with the EU and eventually rejoining the customs union and single market begins after the next election, but whisper this, we don't want the "less than astute" voters to realise this!!

[MadAmster]

Brexit supporters want to keep up the pretence that Brexit isn't the issue, it wasn't implemented properly. Fortunately the dial is turning towards the realisation that Brexit was the UK shooting itself in the foot. The move towards better elations with the EU and eventually rejoining the customs union and single market begins after the next election, but whisper this, we don't want the "less than astute" voters to realise this!!

Whilst on holiday last week, I got chatting to a bloke from Coffintree who siad exactly the bit I've "bolded". He went on to say it hasn't been implemented at all. As we were in a bar I refrained from telling him he's a plonker and changed the conversation. I must be getting old. Despite being much closer to a gallon than to my first pint I held it together. Does old age and beer = common sense?

[swaledale]

Whilst on holiday last week, I got chatting to a bloke from Coffintree who siad exactly the bit I've "bolded". He went on to say it hasn't been implemented at all. As we were in a bar I refrained from telling him he's a plonker and changed the conversation. I must be getting old. Despite being much closer to a gallon than to my first pint I held it together. Does old age and beer = common sense?

I think one just tires of debating with people whose grasp of reality is shaky to say the least!

The problems are many, but people either don't have the intellectual capacity or simply don't invest enough time to understand the issues. Politicians know this of course, which is why we get meaningless 3 word slogans, like Stop the Boats or get Brexit done.

People keep claiming they want politicians to speak the truth and tell it how it is, but in reality most voters don't, they want simple answers to issues. IMO voters get the politicians and governments they deserve.

[Andy_Faber]

Brexit supporters want to keep up the pretence that Brexit isn't the issue

Brexit wasn't the issue, it was the weapon. You (in your life, from what Irecall) went on marches, waved placards, debated etc, they were your weapons, your means to an end whether that end was achieved or not. The Brexiteers equivalent was a cross in a box, that was their weapon, theire means to an end, too early to say if it was achieved

[SithHappens]

Was out with the family a couple of weeks ago, the subject of Brexit came up, don't recall how but my wife was trying to explain how it had had a huge (negative) effect on her business. The BIL piped up that you have to look at the bigger picture and the fact we no longer have to have rules enforced on us anymore is the biggest benefit. So I asked him to tell me what rules he found so awful, even said just tell me one. No surprise he had no clue what rules had so negatively impacted his life while we were in the EU.

I mean seriously, how can you hold that up as your argument and reason for voting for something when you cannot point to one single piece of evidence to support your reasons?

[ramAnag]

Brexit wasn't the issue, it was the weapon. You (in your life, from what Irecall) went on marches, waved placards, debated etc, they were your weapons, your means to an end whether that end was achieved or not. The Brexiteers equivalent was a cross in a box, that was their weapon, theire means to an end, too early to say if it was achieved

But the use of such a ‘weapon’ relies on the ‘box crossers’ being truthfully informed and having a genuine grasp of the issues they were voting about. Without that the Brexit vote was nothing more than a ‘weapon’ of mass destruction as has subsequently been proved.

[swaledale]

Brexit wasn't the issue, it was the weapon. You (in your life, from what Irecall) went on marches, waved placards, debated etc, they were your weapons, your means to an end whether that end was achieved or not. The Brexiteers equivalent was a cross in a box, that was their weapon, theire means to an end, too early to say if it was achieved

At least when I went on marches or signed petitions there was a clear objective, some of which were achieved either in whole or in part!

Not entirely sure that those who voted for Brexit actually knew what they were voting for or what they hoped to achieve, but the reality is most of it wasn't remotely achievable and as for its too late to say whether it was achieved, mm we haven't stopped immigration, there's no extra money for the NHS, we never lost any Sovereignty and in any case are busy doing trade deals that involves agreeing the same sort of rules as with the EU, you can't reverse time, so turning the clock back to the 1950's isn't possible, we don't have the same benefits as when we were in the EU, its ****ed the economy especially financial services and we are retaing many rules because without them we can't export to the EU our biggest market. Oh and we are agreeing trade deals that will **** UK Farmers!