Westminster Politics

Vidyoyo said:
I predict there's gonna be huge demonstrations over this. Very much hoping the Tories are still in charge when it kicks off.
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Not more than a few months ago, when they were predicting £3000 energy bills, loads of people thought it was just an exaggeration. Well we will soon wish it was just that.
But the fact is that in reality, energy bills are going through the roof.

So enjoy the sun while it lasts because reality is about to bite and bite very hard indeed.
 
Paul the Wolf said:
But Brexit was done. The UK left the EU. The only problem with the NI protocol is that the UK government are trying to break it. Will Johnson's successor have the guts to proceed in breaking the law.
The rest of what happens after Brexit is purely what people fantasised would happen because they believed the lies. Quite clearly all the fantasy stuff wouldn't and could never have happened.
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The will of the people was Brexit ...it was circumvented by politicians and Boris reaped the benefits.
 
Buster15 said:
Not more than a few months ago, when they were predicting £3000 energy bills, loads of people thought it was just an exaggeration. Well we will soon wish it was just that.
But the fact is that in reality, energy bills are going through the roof.

So enjoy the sun while it lasts because reality is about to bite and bite very hard indeed.
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And we have a caretaker PM who has announced no new policies until his successor is chosen, likely in several months time.
 
Rishi would be the perfect Tory leader to compete against in a GE. Not even the most diehard Tory would be able to say that he's a man of the people, plus he's one of the worst public speakers I've ever seen.

Starmer would just need to show some personality in the debates to win.
 
Maticmaker said:
The will of the people was Brexit ...it was circumvented by politicians and Boris reaped the benefits.
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If and when Johnson goes will his successor have the gall and temerity to carry on with this brash denial of the real world. Even the dim-witted and extreme Brexiters will succumb without Boris telling them what to say. Johnson can keep it up because he is a professional liar and thick-skinned. Don't see any of the others keeping up the pretence for long.
 
Maticmaker said:
The will of the people was Brexit ...it was circumvented by politicians and Boris reaped the benefits.
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Theresa is that you?

But seriously was it though? It was based on a ginormous pack of lies, and the majority of the country didn't vote for it. Think it is disingenuous to refer to a complete fanatsy as "the will of the people", but to be fair this argument has been going on for years.
 
The Cat said:
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Quite enjoyed his "reshuffling cat shite on a litter tray" metaphor. Very apt.

The Tory Party are an utter disgrace and have to carry the can for Boris's bullshit. The likes of Sunak and Javid propped this bellend up for years and cannot escape the blame, no matter how hard they try.
 
amidst the clown show, the UK's continued slide into fascism goes unnoticed.

The British Parliament is debating a national security bill which could undermine the basis of national security reporting and ultimately throw journalists in jail for life.

A person convicted under the new offense of “obtaining or disclosing protected information,” defined in Section 1 of National Security Bill 2022, faces a fine, life imprisonment, or both, if convicted following a jury trial.

A review of the parliamentary debate on the bill makes clear that work by press outlets such as WikiLeaks is at the heart of Tory and Labour MPs’ thinking as they push to make the bill law.

As currently written, direct-action protests, such as those conducted by Palestine Action against U.K.-based Israeli weapons manufacturer Elbit Systems Ltd, could also be captured under the offences of “sabotage” and entering “prohibited places” sections of the bill.

Whistleblowers, journalists and publishers focusing on national security related matters may be most at risk of being prosecuted, though any person who “copies,” “retains,” “discloses,” “distributes” or “provides access to” so called protected information could be prosecuted.

“Protected information” is defined as any “restricted material” and it need not even be classified.

Under this bill, leakers, whistleblowers, journalists or everyday members of the public, face a potential life sentence if they receive or share “protected information” which is widely defined.

That does not mean imprisonment from one day “up to” a life sentence. If a judge determines a fine isn’t suitable enough punishment the only alternative is life in prison. Following a conviction, a judge would have no choice but to either issue a fine or hand down a life sentence, or both.

[Read the bill in its entirety here.]

There is no public interest or journalistic defense in the bill, a fact noted by some of the parliamentarians during the debates.

“The glaring omission at the heart of the National Security Bill is a straightforward public-interest defense, so that those who expose wrongdoing, either as whistleblowers or journalists, will be protected,” Tim Dawson, a long-time member of the National Union of Journalists’ National Executive Council told Consortium News.

“Without this, there is a risk of concerned U.K. citizens being prosecuted as though they were foreign spies,” he added.

[Related: Sweeping Threat to Free Speech in U.K,]

The bill can be seen as part of a growing crackdown in both Britain and the United States against legitimate journalism that challenges establishment narratives.

In many respects, the proposed law, which applies to people both inside and outside the U.K., shares many elements with the draconian 1917 Espionage Act, which the U.S. government is using to prosecute WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange.

Assange is charged with 17 offenses under the Espionage Act, amounting to a maximum 170 years in prison. None of the charges allege conspiring with a foreign power and merely pertain to receiving and publishing documents leaked to him by U.S. Army whistleblower Chelsea Manning.

No Evidence of Harm

As is the case with the U.S.’ Espionage Act, no evidence of actual harm needs to be proven by prosecutors in order to secure a conviction under the National Security Bill.

There is a broad test of whether the defendant knows or “ought reasonably to know” that their conduct is “prejudicial to safety or interests of the U.K.”

What is, or is not, “prejudicial” to the “safety” or “interests” of the U.K. is also to be determined by the government of the day, according to long established case law from the U.K.’s highest court.

This could include anything from environmental, energy, climate and housing policy, to policing, foreign affairs or military policy.

WikiLeaks-Style Publications

A review of the parliamentary debates over the bill shows that although it is being justified on the basis of protecting the U.K. from the “serious threat from state-backed attacks on assets, including sites, data and infrastructure critical to the U.K.’s safety or interests,” national security leaks and reporting – including that of WikiLeaks — is explicitly in the minds of at least some of the key politicians supporting the bill.

“Will the right honourable lady condemn the WikiLeaks-type mass dumping of information in the public domain? It is hugely irresponsible and can put lives at risk,” Tory MP Theresa Villiers asked Labour’s Shadow Home Secretary Yevette Cooper, on June 6.

“Yes, I strongly do, because some of the examples of such leaks that we have seen put agents’ lives at risk, put vital parts of our national security and intelligence infrastructure at risk and are highly irresponsible,” Cooper replied, adding, “We need safeguards to protect against that kind of damaging impact on our national security.”

There is no evidence that anything published by WikiLeaks has resulted in the loss of life.

A U.S.-leaked government report itself concluded that there was “no significant ‘strategic impact’ to the release of the [Iraq War Logs and Afghanistan War Diary]”, from the Manning leaks which Assange is being prosecuted over. “No actual harm [against an individual]” could be shown either, a lawyer acting for the U.S. government admitted during Assange’s extradition hearings.

This contradicts the official government line that the leaks caused serious harm.


Broad Threat

Among the many disclosures revealed by WikiLeaks, include the secret texts of proposed corporate and investor rights treaties such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

These treaties, which were being negotiated in secret and would not have been known to the citizens until just before or even after they had become law, would have preferenced corporate rights over domestic laws and subordinated labor, environmental and health protections and climate policy to the profit-making imperatives of private industry. Their passage stalled after their draft texts were leaked and then published by WikiLeaks.

WikiLeaks revelations also include dramatic incidents such as the execution of 10 handcuffed Iraqi civilians in their family home, including four women, two children and three infants, by U.S. soldiers who later ordered an airstrike to cover it up.

Many around the world might still believe that a U.K. plan to build the world’s largest “marine park” in the Chagos Islands was motivated by environmental concerns, were it not for a cable published by WikiLeaks revealing that the true purpose was to prevent the indigenous population from ever being able to return to their land.
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https://consortiumnews.com/2022/07/07/uk-bill-threatens-journalists-with-life-in-prison/

johnson isn't the only problem and neither are the tories when you have direct opposition support for this kind of shit.
 
Maticmaker said:
The will of the people was Brexit
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If we are honest, this is quite a cowardly throwaway argument. It isnt surprising that the cowardly politicans have run with it. It is very easy to point back to a 52-48 referendum result, with lots of promises but precious little detail, and yell 'WILL OF THE PEOPLE!'. If Boris, May or yourself truly believed that Brexit was the will of the people, why not have any sort of confirmatory referendum once a deal had been agreed (or not)? Why not entertain the idea that as with most other areas in life, people change their minds. If we are honest, the likes of Farage and Bojo were nothing more than opportunists who pounced upon a very tight referendum result based mostly on lies, and ran with it, with absolutely no attempt to actually confirm or have the most basic common sense check. Instead they just parroted the same soundbites about WILL OF THE PEOPLE and GERRONWIVIT because they knew it was their best way to get/stay in power, influence and wealth.
 
Rado_N said:
“The people” didn’t have a fecking clue what Brexit meant, and still don’t.
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It meant all things to different people. Because most all of them who voted to leave voted for their own personal view of what Brexit meant to them.
It was an ideology based on an illusion.
An illusion that if the UK left the Bogyman that was the EU, it would lead to freedom from anything and everything.
Zero immigration.
Zero rules.
And everyone would live happily ever after.

It was a lie just like all the other lies people swallowed gleefully.
And they have been so brainwashed that they continue to believe in it.
 
Frosty said:
Also the UK pursued the hardest Brexit possible, the one which during the campaign was deemed so extreme it was laughed off as a possibility.
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But other than slightly better terms and remaining in some of the organisations, which the UK would have to pay for, Brexit could only mean leaving the Single Market and the Customs Union, otherwise it was pointless. The Labour leadership never got their head around this and Starmer still doesn't.

If the Uk stayed in the single market they would have to accept the 4 freedoms. If they stayed in the Customs Union, they couldn't make their own trade deals (which they aren't doing anyway).

I still see talk of joining the single market or the custom's union and maybe the EU later. This is just as daft as the UK leaving in the first place.
 
Buster15 said:
It meant all things to different people. Because most all of them who voted to leave voted for their own personal view of what Brexit meant to them.
It was an ideology based on an illusion.
An illusion that if the UK left the Bogyman that was the EU, it would lead to freedom from anything and everything.
Zero immigration.
Zero rules.
And everyone would live happily ever after.

It was a lie just like all the other lies people swallowed gleefully.
And they have been so brainwashed that they continue to believe in it.
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So…. Basically, they didn’t have a fecking clue what Brexit meant, and still don’t.
 
Rado_N said:
“The people” didn’t have a fecking clue what Brexit meant, and still don’t.
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I’m hoping that somehow this might set the path to a second referendum. I know some will say “we had our vote respect democracy” but democracy is about giving people the chance to change their minds. Now we’ve seen the reality ( as someone who wanted to stay in the EU I know not all of it is down to Brexit but most of it is or the intensity of what’s bad is) hopefully a second vote will give people a chance to fix our future
 
DeGea’sFeet said:
I’m hoping that somehow this might set the path to a second referendum. I know some will say “we had our vote respect democracy” but democracy is about giving people the chance to change their minds. Now we’ve seen the reality ( as someone who wanted to stay in the EU I know not all of it is down to Brexit but most of it is or the intensity of what’s bad is) hopefully a second vote will give people a chance to fix our future
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That should have happened before it was finalised.

“This is the deal we have, should we proceed with this or remain in the EU?”

It’s too late now. No chance of revisiting the situation in less than a decade, if not two.
 
DeGea’sFeet said:
I’m hoping that somehow this might set the path to a second referendum. I know some will say “we had our vote respect democracy” but democracy is about giving people the chance to change their minds. Now we’ve seen the reality ( as someone who wanted to stay in the EU I know not all of it is down to Brexit but most of it is or the intensity of what’s bad is) hopefully a second vote will give people a chance to fix our future
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There is no chance the EU would accept the UK back for a very long time. I don't think the damage the British government has done to their image, reputation and trustworthiness is realised in the UK.
 
Berbasbullet said:
Theresa is that you?

But seriously was it though? It was based on a ginormous pack of lies, and the majority of the country didn't vote for it. Think it is disingenuous to refer to a complete fanatsy as "the will of the people", but to be fair this argument has been going on for years.
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Everything about the referendum was wrong because a group of politicians got the wrong question at the wrong time, a real 'Pandoras box' . Neverthe less they did get a 'public will' result from those who could be bothered to vote.
To refuse to implement it allowed a chancer like Boris to get his dream job, he was a buffoon and didn't really solve or get done anything, what he did do was sideline other more dangerous people such as Farage. Boris nipped in first and made use of a Tory party that was completely demoralised by years of infight over the EU.
Hopefully the lesson has been learned, if you don't have the answer assured ..don't ask the question! Let's hope from now on our politicians will have that self discipline .
 
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Berbasbullet said:
Theresa is that you?

But seriously was it though? It was based on a ginormous pack of lies, and the majority of the country didn't vote for it. Think it is disingenuous to refer to a complete fanatsy as "the will of the people", but to be fair this argument has been going on for years.
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Agreed. Absolute fantasy phrase / buzz words. Shows how easily people are manipulated. And I'm not even an ardent remainer.
 
Fluctuation0161 said:
Agreed. Absolute fantasy phrase / buzz words. Shows how easily people are manipulated. And I'm not even an ardent remainer.
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Corbyn got loads of flack for that interview where he gave the EU 7.5 out of 10 and explained why, on balance, membership was a good thing. The irony is that if politicians had taken that approach over the past 45 years (telling the truth about the EU) and not blamed it for every bad thing which happened to the UK, regardless of cause, we may still be a member.
 
Frosty said:
Corbyn got loads of flack for that interview where he gave the EU 7.5 out of 10 and explained why, on balance, membership was a good thing. The irony is that if politicians had taken that approach over the past 45 years (telling the truth about the EU) and not blamed it for every bad thing which happened to the UK, regardless of cause, we may still be a member.
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I'd argue 7.5 out of 10 would mean that it's better for the country to remain and the party to make that clear though. I've got nothing particularly against Corbyn, but the stating of the benefits of staying in and not making that a policy makes them pretty un-voteable for some. That remains true of Starmer now who seems to be saying the same thing, but in a different way around Brexit.

I agree with you about the years of blaming the EU for every bad government policy.
 
I think Rishi being made leader is bad news for Labour.

Voters generally don't care if someone's rich, if anything it leads weight to the idea that it's someone important. He speaks well, holds the centre well, came out of the Boris years looking good and will parrot all the crap about his poor background and inspiring change in the fashion of the Obama campaign. We've seen he's got a good team behind him.

With Boris you could guarantee a Conservative loss but 2 years is a long time to a general election for the memory of the average voter. The tactical voting pact between Labour and Lib dem may well be needed more than ever.
 
Maticmaker said:
In the sense of 'standing bye and doing nothing' yes. I never kidded myself that Boris was a knight in shining armour, and couldn't bring myself to vote for him, even though I do believe he was championing the cause of acting to carry out the will of the people, which the majority of politicians were not. At that time otherwise reasonable politicians were all doing 'topsy-turvy' acts of dishonesty really (but better at it than Boris) for one reason or another. Neither could I vote, even in protest sense for Jeremy, a total international socialist he is, but in my eyes 'not a Labour man'.

Being brutally honest I suppose if I had lived in a red wall constituency ... I just might have voted for Boris. However I live in a rock solid labour constituency, so I could afford the luxury of obeying my conscience in which I had vowed I would never vote again if the will of the people was not carried out... but of course knowing the Labour candidate would triumph. It was a cop-out I know. but then again we all play Boris's games, at various times, he just does it all the time and is 'bl**dy hopeless' at it.

I genuinely thought that once Boris has settled the Brexit question, the Tory Grandee's would have moved swiftly to organised his demise; however there were two problems; Brexit wasn't really done (NI Protocol) and then Covid arrived, who better than Boris in the hot seat, either a hero or a sacrificial lamb, or as it turned out...both!
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If you think he was acting to carry out the will of the people…doesn’t that mean your conscience dictated you had to vote for him? Or are you drawing some distinction here I can’t quite see?
 
Rado_N said:
That should have happened before it was finalised.

“This is the deal we have, should we proceed with this or remain in the EU?”

It’s too late now. No chance of revisiting the situation in less than a decade, if not two.
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Paul the Wolf said:
There is no chance the EU would accept the UK back for a very long time. I don't think the damage the British government has done to their image, reputation and trustworthiness is realised in the UK.
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While I hope for the best and that one day we rejoin, realistically I do think you guys are right.
 
Brwned said:
If you think he was acting to carry out the will of the people…doesn’t that mean your conscience dictated you had to vote for him? Or are you drawing some distinction here I can’t quite see?
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I think the will of the people had to be acted upon, but didn't want a chancer such as Boris championing that cause. The only positive thing ( from my perspective ) was Boris wasn't Farage, who was all together a different proposition. I think history might reflect that we should be thankful to Boris he headed Farage off at the pass. Farage believed what he said and would have been more difficult to remove, than comedian Boris
 
A significant minority voted brexit purely because of racist attitudes to immigration. Now they are going to have to vote for a brown man as their leader in a GE and he's not even a hard brexit loon. Karma. Unless of course Farage pops back up with his brexit party, thus guaranteeing a labour win....
 
marktan said:
I think Rishi being made leader is bad news for Labour.

Voters generally don't care if someone's rich, if anything it leads weight to the idea that it's someone important. He speaks well, holds the centre well, came out of the Boris years looking good and will parrot all the crap about his poor background and inspiring change in the fashion of the Obama campaign. We've seen he's got a good team behind him.

With Boris you could guarantee a Conservative loss but 2 years is a long time to a general election for the memory of the average voter. The tactical voting pact between Labour and Lib dem may well be needed more than ever.
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What poor background? He went to one of the oldest schools in the UK, Oxbridge, Ivy League, then investment banking and is rich as feck. Cannot be more elite than that and unlike Johnson, is not able to pull off the relatable Man of the People act. Not convinced either that he has any change in mind or a big idea, other than let’s go back to the Thatcher years.

I see his team are quick off the blocks, but they seem to be saying let’s credit Rishi with all the good parts about the economy but he is not responsible for the bad bits (which he could have influenced). He might win the leadership, but I think he has major weaknesses in GE race, including being thin skinned. Labour should look forward to a campaign with him in charge.
 
Kind of wild that the first female PM and the first non-white PM could both be Conservatives.
 
SilentWitness said:
Kind of wild that the first female PM and the first non-white PM could both be Conservatives.
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They care more about wealth and power than gender or race.

Sidenote: despite the large body of evidence of racism in the party. Lining their own pockets trumps that.

I always find it cynical that they implement the most inherently prejudiced and racial policies with ethnic minority ministers for PR. Priti Patel and flights to Rwanda is a recent example.
 
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