EU Ref

[blythburgh]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36700350

A legal firm is claiming that Britain can't trigger Article 50 without the consent of Parliament. ie. A Prime Minister cannot do it alone - they have to get it agreed by Parliament first.

I'm surprised this is even open to debate. Parliament is our sovereign law-making body, not the vox pop of a referendum, nor the whims of a single Prime Minister. We decide much lesser matters in Parliament, surely the repeal of a law of this magnitude has to go through Parliament?

I agree this has to be thoroughly debated in Parliament. But could they really go against the referendum result?

Personally I would like a second referendum when we know what the Brexit negotiations result in. Or should we leave the final decision to MPS after all the negotiations?

And those give the vote to those most affected by the result who are currently voiceless. Namely those ex pats who have lived in the EU for more than 5 years and the 16/17 year olds. After all the ex pats were promised a vote (well if makes sense to the Govt, because they will mostly vote Tory) and 16/17 year olds got the vote for the Scottish Referendum

As I have said in the past, we elect our MPs to do a job (Yes I know they are useless at it) Let them get on with it. We should not have had the first referendum, never mind a second. it was all about Cameron trying to appease the right wingers in the conservative party and failed miserably.

Dave gambled with the future of our country twice and could end up losing both in the long term. Or maybe against all the odds we stay in the EU or rejoin the EU and keep Scotland as part of Great Britain.

How long we keep NI in the UK is totally different story of course.

[Chadwick]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36700350

A legal firm is claiming that Britain can't trigger Article 50 without the consent of Parliament. ie. A Prime Minister cannot do it alone - they have to get it agreed by Parliament first.

I'm surprised this is even open to debate. Parliament is our sovereign law-making body, not the vox pop of a referendum, nor the whims of a single Prime Minister. We decide much lesser matters in Parliament, surely the repeal of a law of this magnitude has to go through Parliament?

I agree this has to be thoroughly debated in Parliament. But could they really go against the referendum result?

Parliament could take the easy route and just go with the referendum result, but I think that is a complete dereliction of their duties. We elect MPs to review, discuss, change and ultimately approve or reject laws. To do this they have to look at the information available, which includes, but is not limited to, the referendum result.

I think they need to view the referendum result with some caution, and not treat it as "the will of the people".

The Leave option returned a slight majority, but what is that instructing parliament to do? It is clearly out of the question that we cut all ties with the EU, but no-one set out what the options were. Some Leave voters have voted out for perfectly good, evidence-based reasons, but without stating what they want instead. Deciding to invoke Article 50 and leave the EU runs the risk of not achieving what these voters wanted - would this really be seen as obeying the wishes of the majority?

A further element of the Leave vote have been mislead and betrayed by the lies of the Leave campaign. They were promised things which were undeliverable and which have been rapidly retracted. The leaders of their campaign have stepped aside or started fighting each other. The people that fell for the lies are left with nothing; no-one is going to deliver what they voted for (they never were). Should they even be counted as part of the Leave vote total, when they were voting for fairytales and shadows?

Finally, there was a far right vote for Leave. The morons who wanted to get rid of foreigners, regardless of whether they were from the EU, and with little understanding of what they were voting for, or any other impact it might have. Should Parliament agree with this sentiment as a valid basis for leaving the EU? I doubt the other Leave voters want to be associated with this section of society.

The referendum itself was called as party political gamble by Cameron, so it's debatable whether it was ever in the public interest anyway. But I'll let that go, because regardless of the reason for it, it still happened.

So we're left with a referendum result with a slim majority where the winning vote is fractured and doesn't represent a clear option. Parliament needs to decide how important that result is when weighing up the pros and cons.

34.7% of the electorate wanted to Remain in the EU
37.5% of the electorate wanted to Leave, but we don't know how many wanted no EU at all, just no immigration, foreigners sent home, stay in single market, £350m for NHS or what
27.8% of the electorate expressed no preference

I don't think the referendum result was a majority for "leave and see what we can negotiate". It's far from a decisive result, and Parliament needs to weigh that up carefully before reaching a decision.

[macliam]

The problem is, you can't put the genie back into the bottle.

When almost 30% of the voters can't be bothered to vote for something so important, what chance is there. But this was fairly predictable, given the question asked - because in a binary choice there is always more inclination to vote for change than to protect the status quo, for an active vote against a passive one. Equally, not setting a benchmark other than "a majority" was always going to result in "what ifs" and complaints from the losing side.

So in one action, your mate Dave has managed to polarise opinion and throw British politics into a spin, quite a legacy.

[Sarah]

I think whilst it's pretty silly to talk about another referendum right now, once leaving has been kicked far enough into the long grass for emotions to calm and everyone is instead utterly fed up of the endless impasse on trade negotiations, immigration, etc, when we've seen enough of rising prices, spiraling debt or savage cuts, etc, and when everyone has learned a lot more about what the EU actually does and what the benefits of staying or leaving really are, especially the risks either way, when almost-ignored issues like the impact on Northern Ireland peace begin to loom and at last all the playground stuff has given way to realpolitik, there'll be an appetite for another vote of some kind. It'll make a lot more sense at that time and a provide a much more meaningful result.

[Chadwick]

The problem is, you can't put the genie back into the bottle.

When almost 30% of the voters can't be bothered to vote for something so important, what chance is there. But this was fairly predictable, given the question asked - because in a binary choice there is always more inclination to vote for change than to protect the status quo, for an active vote against a passive one. Equally, not setting a benchmark other than "a majority" was always going to result in "what ifs" and complaints from the losing side.

So in one action, your mate Dave has managed to polarise opinion and throw British politics into a spin, quite a legacy.

Oh, don't worry about Dave, I've saved some scorn for him, for setting up this whole f-up in the first place. He's poked the beehive just to prove a point, and got stung. And now we risk losing the honey too. Well done Dave.

Hindsight is a marvellous thing, and looking back it seems ludicrous that we would hold a referendum on something this important without building in appropriate safeguards. I guess no-one understood that despite decades of British apathy about the EU, underneath we really did give a shit, one way or another.

[kevinchess1]

because in a binary choice there is always more inclination to vote for change than to protect the status quo,

You really need to start your post with 'In my opinion' instead of presenting your opinions as 'Substantiated facts.'

1975 Referendum vote Voted to protect the status quo,
2012 PR Voter voted to protect the status quo,
2015 Scottish independence voted to protect the status quo,

So that's 3-1 to the Status quo

[Chadwick]

because in a binary choice there is always more inclination to vote for change than to protect the status quo,

You really need to start your post with 'In my opinion' instead of presenting your opinions as 'Substantiated facts.'

1975 Referendum vote Voted to protect the status quo,
2012 PR Voter voted to protect the status quo,
2015 Scottish independence voted to protect the status quo,

So that's 3-1 to the Status quo

Are we protecting Status Quo in case they're the next ones to die?

[kevinchess1]

Well
The way things are going this year....