Out has become Right, unfortunately. Murdoch's press have been driving the anti-EU agenda for years. I don't see why Sky would suddenly be pro-Remain. May has been trying this 'no deal is better than a bad deal' bluff for months and is getting found out as no deal is pretty disastrous. She is, for want of a better phrase, a useless **** miles out of her depth who has lucked upon a job she'd never have been elected into.
There are some headbangers in the Tory right, but there were very effective Leave campaigners in Labour, and Corbyn is a genuine Leaver. Sky News is pro-Remain. I don't think Murdoch controls it, there'd be journalists leaving complaining that their professional integrity is compromised. Just as BBC Radio 4's Today program talks of the BBC as a separate entity. When May goes into these tough negotiations, she has to speak softly and carry a big stick. If she isn't prepared to go for WTO rules, the EU will sense it and offer very little. It has to be our bottom line. Most of this is about money. If they can agree on that, all else will eventually fall into place so long as the EU don't try to put controls on us re trading outside the EU.
There may be a compromise, excluding unskilled coming in without a job etc. Realistically, the immigration figures won't go down much, if at all, for the first few years. We have low unemployment, so there are the jobs (but we need to work at that rump of UK unemployed for their own good if nothing else). The ultimate say in whether someone from the EU comes in, must lie with Parliament and not Brussels
The Lib Dems are deeply entrenched Remoaners. They want a second referendum, this on the terms of leaving. If the terms offered by the EU are really poor, this will give the Lib Dems material with which to persuade the country to abandon Brexit altogether. I'm convinced the likes of Farron and Clegg would collude with Brussels to bring this about. Sky News and the BBC follow the Lib Dems lead. And obviously, if the EU thinks that by offering us a meagre deal, they can get us all to change their minds - then hell, they will!
Sadly we won't get a say on how we leave. May will throw us head first into a hard Brexit instead to maintain her position and appease idiots. I don't think the EU would offer a poor deal to sway Brits. They'd do it in the interests of their citizens. We are the ones who initiated this divorce.
If the EU thought they could change the result, they'd do it like a shot. Apart from anything else, we're deep pocket I'd be amazed if we end up with a hard Brexit. Apart from a few extremists in the UK and the EU, no one wants it. Both sides want a deal, but we're seeing a lot of positioning at the moment. If you have a legal claim and want to get £100,000, you ask for at least £ I million.
I think you must be very paranoid. I watch a lot of Sky News when in Norway. Most of their political jounalists are clearly Tory and Pro Brexit. The Lib Dems are small. While Corbyn runs Labour nothing is going to stop Brexit. Unfortunately.
We're obviously not going to agree on SKY News bias. The Lib Dems aren't small in the House of Lords if they wanted to be difficult. We've got local elections coming up, and I think we'll see the LD's pick up a lot of seats based on their continued support for Remain. It'll put wind behind their sails, as if there isn't enough wind coming from them already. UKIP will suffer badly because no one knows what they're for anymore. Labour will lose some although the elections are mostly in the shires, where Labour don't have many seats. Conservatives will do well. I just want the country's politicians to avoid all the Machiavellian stuff, get behind the negotiators and get a decent deal that isn't a hard Brexit.
But presumably you are prepared for and will accept a hard Brexit if it comes to that, because even though only the Remain side talked about it during the referendum campaign, it has always been one of the potential outcomes. Given that the negotiation cannot satisfy the 48% Remainers it only takes 5% of those who voted Leave last June to prefer staying in than accepting the ultimate negotiated terms for a clear Remain majority. Which is a good argument for a referendum on it.
I'll accept a hard Brexit if the EU makes unreasonable demands. It has to be our fall back situation. Your second paragraph assumes that the split remains at 48% - 52%. I've lost count of the number of people who tell me they voted Remain, but now that we're leaving, want to get it done on the best possible terms and accept there's no turning back. A second referendum simply encourages the EU to give us poor terms in the hope we'll be intimidated into changing course
Latest poll of polls (27 March) has it 44% leave, 43% remain, 13% don't know, before each side published negotiating positions. Of course it's a poll and not to be trusted, but I'd tend to take it more seriously than an unknown number of your acquaintances asked a question by a vocal Brexiter. If a few people realise that 'the best possible terms' are worse than the current situation the balance swings. Even the hard core Brexiters aren't going to get what they want unless there is a hard stop to immigration, we pay nothing to the EU and we can trade freely. Which isn't going to happen.
http://www.shortlist.com/news/120-000-leave-voters-died-since-brexit Check out the table a few paragraphs in. Also this is from early December.
Poll of Polls got the Brexit result wrong. Depends where you look. John Curtis, who's predictions are uncannily accurate, has 37% of the public believing we'll get a good deal from the EU, against 32% who don't.
