It's not all about UK v EU. We're beginning to see the first splits in the EU with Donald Tusk, who has always struck me as a reasonable man, implicitly criticizing Junckers88 for breaking confidences after what was designated a private meeting. Junckers88 has already pledged that Brexit cannot be a success. He is not fit to be part of these talks. At some stage, the Council of Europe will wake up to that fact.
It's just occurred to me that 1) this should be on the politics thread; and 2) Junckers and his leakers, the €100bn, the EU jurisdiction over EU citizens in the U.K. etc etc, all the things you would classify as 'threats' could well be doing May a favour. At the end of all this she can turn round to the electorate and say "look, this is what the EU wanted, and we got a deal without giving them anything like that. We win!" And that way she can also give the EU quite a lot while still appearing 'strong'. In fact, my mind is sufficiently twisted to wonder if she Junckers et al have colluded in this little show of 'toughness' for public consumption and the whole thing is already stitched up and they are going through the motions. But then I realise that absolutely no one involved is clever or trusting enough for that to happen. Shame. I like Tusk. Why are some bits of the British media implying that he was having a go at May because he referred to 'emotions'?
Juncker is using the US litigation trick of asking for the world, in the hope that the fraction of it he receives is bigger than it might have been otherwise. I'm not sure many believe in the £100 bn claim so May would be ill-advised to make reference to it when justifying any final settlement. There will have to be huge analysis of numbers, and the media will be all over it. Of course, there will be a discretionary add on, difficult to quantify, for getting a free trade deal. I agree with you about Tusk. May did come out quite strongly against the EU for purportedly interfering in our election, but this was responding to Juncker's and Selmayr's scullduggery. Juncker is the problem.
For ****'s sake! I am sick to death of hearing this lie over and over again from the government's opponents. All we hear from everyone on the left is how May is attacking the EU and going for a hard brexit. The truth is that the government have been totally reasonable about their plans for brexit, , saying that we want a good deal for everyone on both sides of the channel, up until the monstrous Juncker and his hard line friends went on the attack. It is the hard line Brussels beaurocrats who want a hard brexit and it has been them doing all the threatening. May finally turned which is what the British do if you threaten them. Stop rewriting history.
Everyone on the left, Col? Corbyn, McDonnell. McCluskey and the far left of Labour have been pro-Brexit since 1975! Which is why they've backed May all the way. I'm talking about the One Nation, pro-business, pro-European Tories. Like Ken Clarke, Heseltine, Cameron, Osborn and a pre-2017 May. The CBI, the IoD and countless CEOs - all of who are against a Hard Brexit or no deal. None of them can be described as Left! Junker I agree is a clown, but I see no reason why May has to unite the rest of the EU by deliberately provoking them with this rhetoric. I thought we'd got a grown up when she beat Boris, but its just more Project Fear to try and panic the population into line.
You can see from the local election results why she has been pursuing this Hard Brexit stance - it steals UKIP's clothes and makes them irrelevant in the GE, with their votes switching to the Tories. Interestingly, despite the 'disastrous' Labour performance in the local elections, the Tory lead in the national vote was only 11%. That wouldn't give her the landslide that she craves - Cameron had a 7% lead in 2015.
For the last time........THEY are provoking us, not the other way around!! What should we do, just roll over? That's what Corbyn and his band of clowns would do. It is the EU hard liners who are trying to provoke a hard brexit, NOT May, who, I suspect would prefer a much softer brexit. Now, I'm no true blue Tory and I've already said that I would struggle to know who to vote for in the up-coming election if it were not for brexit, but enough of this doom and gloom. There are plenty of business leaders who believe that we can do very well outside the EU and all that entails. The CBI and many others have a terrible record of predicting anything.
I totally agree that little opposition to any government is very unhealthy. That's hardly the Torys' fault though. Although, please, please stop saying May is inflexible to to brexit. It's the EU hard liners who are being inflexible and want a hard brexit, not May.
At the moment she is giving the impression that she wants everything but won't give much if anything to get it. Goldie is probably right, it's all posturing, equally from the EU side, hopefully some grown up negotiating will start after 8 June. What I am hoping is that she uses the giant majority she will undoubtedly get to ignore those in her own party and the kipper fellow travellers she will attract who genuinely do want no deal, and align with the vast majority of her own MPs who were Remainers (including, allegedly, herself), to minimise the pain. And you are right, it's not the Tories fault that their opposition are on the limp side of pathetic, but it does place the onus on them to remember that they represent the entire country, not just people who voted a particular way, and to act accordingly. A massive majority in government creates more responsibility to listen. My core problem is that I honestly don't rate her, but at the same time I rate Leadsom, Johnson, Fox, Corbyn and Farron even less.
May is inflexible though. At least, she has been so far. We chose to leave but seem to want it all on our terms. Be sensible with freedom of movement and we'll have no issues with trade. Pander to the far right and the other side obviously won't bend over backwards to accommodate that.
As we're on the GE thread I'll get back on topic. London didn't vote yesterday, its next year I think; but I've had elections where I've voted labour, Tory and liberal at the same time. As well as the London mayor, Tower Hamlets (where I live) has its own mayor - recently deposed Lutfur Rahman was elected primarily on the back of Bengali and Somali votes who he paid back in kind. In the GE it will be a choice between Rahman's mob in the shape of Respect or the sitting labour MP. The Tories or the lib dems won't get a look in.
Ferocious questioning of Saint Theresa this afternoon by the fiercely unbiased Laura Kuenssberg.......... 'Prime Minister, in the light of today's local election results, do you still insist that a landslide General Election victory is in any doubt?' (not a verbatim quote, but it was something like that)
She should have known that when you have bogus numbers that are impossible to substantiate, you don't announce them on LBC, you put them on the side of a bus and drive it around the country.
Not a bad idea. Every time she has an interview, her researchers can drive a bus past the nearest window with the correct answer pasted to the side
The result of the referendum means we can't continue with freedom of movement. We voted to leave mate.
