It doesn’t get automatic priority over government business unless Corbyn puts the motion down
I don't think they need automatic priority of government business, they just need the ability to have a vote some time before Exit Day. If they needed Corbyn to then put down his own motion of the appropriate form then they could - once you've passed "informally, we have no confidence in the government but would have confidence in X instead", you've pretty much proved that you've got the votes for "formally, we have no confidence in the government".
The problem isn't showing the Commons has no confidence in Johnson (that's pretty much taken for granted already). The issue is being 100% certain that it can agree it does have confidence in someone else within 14 days of pulling the No Confidence trigger. If Tory rebels rule out Corbyn, and Corbyn rules out everyone else, that leaves no one, so no one dares vote Johnson down.
It doesn’t get automatic priority over government business unless Corbyn puts the motion down
I don't think they need automatic priority of government business, they just need the ability to have a vote some time before Exit Day. If they needed Corbyn to then put down his own motion of the appropriate form then they could - once you've passed "informally, we have no confidence in the government but would have confidence in X instead", you've pretty much proved that you've got the votes for "formally, we have no confidence in the government".
The problem isn't showing the Commons has no confidence in Johnson (that's pretty much taken for granted already). The issue is being 100% certain that it can agree it does have confidence in someone else within 14 days of pulling the No Confidence trigger. If Tory rebels rule out Corbyn, and Corbyn rules out everyone else, that leaves no one, so no one dares vote Johnson down.
Its yet another game of bluff, though, isn’t it? The non-Labour rebels (and some Labour!) don’t want Corbyn, but they’d settle for him temporarily to deal with Brexit. Most Labour MPs want Corbyn but would settle for someone else on the same basis (putting a small ? over Corbyn himself). But if either side shows willingness to go beyond their preference, their position is fatally weakened.
We just have to hope that this time someone does blink.
It doesn’t get automatic priority over government business unless Corbyn puts the motion down
I don't think they need automatic priority of government business, they just need the ability to have a vote some time before Exit Day. If they needed Corbyn to then put down his own motion of the appropriate form then they could - once you've passed "informally, we have no confidence in the government but would have confidence in X instead", you've pretty much proved that you've got the votes for "formally, we have no confidence in the government".
It doesn’t have to get taken at all. And probably won’t. There is a good reason for the Speaker to take a formal VONC, and good reason to take notions like yours during the 14-day period. But not out of the blue just to fill an otherwise boring afternoon.
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Isn't his position essentially Cameron's position? (From before 2014)
If Scottish voters elect a majority )
There's a big difference between Cameron's position for a once-in-a-generation referendum, and supporting holding another referendum just a few years later. However, my point wasn't about the merits or justification of the idea, but about the politics, and the timing. Why provoke a completely unnecessary row and alienate your own Scottish party? And why now? Surely this was a sleeping dog which could have been left snoring in the corner.
A wild stab at explaining it...Labour has given up on SLAB, concluding they are useless. No prospect of gains. Serious prospect of losing MPs. Along comes Swinson, a Scot, threatening to take away even more votes. The Unionist side is a crowded field. Shift to an ambivalent position. Say you don't HAVE to vote SNP to get Indyref 2. Positioning for both VONC, and next Holyrood election. Have a go at soft pro-Indy votes instead? I said it was a wild stab.
It is even a trend (even more modest) within Lib Dem circles.
Better Together is now recognised as a Tory plot, and a huge elephant trap into which Miliband and Clegg allowed their weak/daft Scottish branches to be lured into. The error will not be repeated. British nationalism is alive and well within Tory hearts, but Labour have lost the appetite for it.
I suspect the travails of Labour’s sister-party in Madrid, vis a vis Catalonia has alerted wiser heads. Madrid has dug itself into a hole and it is going to be one hell of a job getting out of it. Not dissimilar to the vindictive partition of Ireland and subsequent periods of Direct Rule, which is still haunting English politics a century later. An error of huge and then-unforeseen importance.
SLab, or parts of SLab, can kick and scream all it likes, but with 40% of its supporters backing independence it’ll have to dial down the Union Jackery one way or another.
Partition of Ireland was not vindictive.
A terrible mistake, yes, but not vindictive
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Isn't his position essentially Cameron's position? (From before 2014)
If Scottish voters elect a majority of representatives on a platform for another referendum and those representatives vote for that in Holyrood then he would not stand in their way. (With the change of the word "a" to "another")
There's a big difference between Cameron's position for a once-in-a-generation referendum, and supporting holding another referendum just a few years later. However, my point wasn't about the merits or justification of the idea, but about the politics, and the timing. Why provoke a completely unnecessary row and alienate your own Scottish party? And why now? Surely this was a sleeping dog which could have been left snoring in the corner.
A wild stab at explaining it...Labour has given up on SLAB, concluding they are useless. No prospect of gains. Serious prospect of losing MPs. Along comes Swinson, a Scot, threatening to take away even more votes. The Unionist side is a crowded field. Shift to an ambivalent position. Say you don't HAVE to vote SNP to get Indyref 2. Positioning for both VONC, and next Holyrood election. Have a go at soft pro-Indy votes instead? I said it was a wild stab.
Ambivalence having gone so well for them over Brexit, they decided to look for other opportunities to deploy the same winning approach?
He won't even talk to Tory MPs on principle; now he's going to vote for one as Prime Minister, and whip his MPs to do likewise? Well, I'll believe that when I see it. We joke on here about Blairites being as bad as Tories in the eyes of the left, but Corbyn enabling Ken Clarke rather than pushing himself forward really would be quite some betrayal as far as his supporters are concerned. And not an easy thing to explain to supporters on doorsteps in the forthcoming general elections, never mind floating voters: there's a reason why politicians tend not to act in the national interest, and it's because they rarely get rewarded for it.
There's no "rather than pushing himself forward". Of course he'd push himself forward. That's the first thing he'd do, and that's the only option you'll hear him entertain in public until the gears start to actually mesh.
The question is whether that option having been defeated and/or clearly shown to be unavailable, he'd support a caretaker Tory for the limited purpose of getting an extension and calling election, or whether he'd keep the current Tory government in place.
Indeed, for 10 days he'd say "Only me, only me, only me"
And then on the eleventh day he has a choice:
- be seen as an enabler of a Tory No Deal Brexit by Metropolitan Remainers. (But hopefully not piss off voters in Leave seats, and allow the Tories to collect most of the blame for any problems that ocurred during No Deal Brexit )
- allow some random caretaker figure (Caroline Lucas? Ken Clarke?) to be PM for an afternoon to ask for an extension. Which might be seen as a betrayal... but it also keeps the Tory Civil War going.
The biggest danger to Corbyn is allow Tory No Deal Brexit to happen... but then it all goes OK. Because then he gets dumped by Metropolitan Remainers, while the Tories get the credit from Leavers of all stripes.
Since when was there any “credit” in politics? Cf. 1945. There is always something to moan about or hope for, and no change ever goes perfectly to plan. In politics there is only hope, and blame. That’s why ultimately the Tories are into a hiding to nothing. All they have left is fear, and the way things are going they are tearing up even that card.
Sees the same arguments going around in the same circles as three days ago, with almost everyone starting from their preferred Brexit conclusion and working backwards, thus generating way more heat than light.
Sees the same arguments going around in the same circles as three days ago, with almost everyone starting from their preferred Brexit conclusion and working backwards, thus generating way more heat than light.
Goes back to lurking for a while longer.
Can't we have an AV thread? Or a pineapple on pizza one?
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
The Marxlst wing of Farage's happy band is a curious, and seemingly growing faction. What could they possibly see in a Party with no membership, no internal democracy and nothing to unite it but blind devotion to the leader and his impractical, idealistic and financially reckless plans?
It’s not curious or strange at all. Mick Hume used to edit a magazine called Living Marxism that was pure Libertarianism from cover to cover. The Marxists and the Libertarians travel together. That’s the real Marxists not the lefty’s in Labour so lazily called Marxist or Communist, the Labour Party is and effectively always has been just another conservative party. How many Labour election wins, how much power, yet the House of Lords still stands, the voting system still the same serving vested interests of the political establishment whilst many millions of votes are rendered meaningless resulting in no representation. The monarch still head of state. What has Labour ever done remotely Marxist or communist? What is so educational about everything that’s happened to U.K. politics in recent years is how you can now clearly understand how Hitlers Third Reich came together. The conservative party’s, like Labour and the Tory's have been for so long, we’re swept aside in a toxic and sinister atmosphere. There’s posts today, excited ones from politicians, celebrating Herdsons decision. Those politicians are wrong, ignorant to what is really going on and of how sad and regressive and dangerous such resignations are. Am I alone? Can you not feel how toxic and sinister the atmosphere is becoming?
Apostrophe horror show. I honestly have no idea about what this means: 'The conservative party’s, like Labour and the Tory's have been for so long, we’re swept aside in a toxic and sinister atmosphere.' Or should that be mean's?
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Isn't his position essentially Cameron's position? (From before 2014)
If Scottish voters elect a majority )
There's a big difference between Cameron's position for a once-in-a-generation referendum, and supporting holding ano
A wild stab at explaining it...Labour has given up on SLAB, concluding they are useless. No prospect of gains. Serious prospect of losing MPs. Along comes Swinson, a Scot, threatening to take away even more votes. The Unionist side is a crowded field. Shift to an ambivalent position. Say you don't HAVE to vote SNP to get Indyref 2. Positioning for both VONC, and next Holyrood election. Have a go at soft pro-Indy votes instead? I said it was a wild stab.
It is even a trend (even more modest) within Lib Dem circles.
Better Together is now recognised as a Tory plot, and a huge elephant trap into which Miliband and Clegg allowed their weak/daft Scottish branches to be lured into. The error will not be repeated. British nationalism is alive and well within Tory hearts, but Labour have lost the appetite for it.
I suspect the travails of Labour’s sister-party in Madrid, vis a vis Catalonia has alerted wiser heads. Madrid has dug itself into a hole and it is going to be one hell of a job getting out of it. Not dissimilar to the vindictive partition of Ireland and subsequent periods of Direct Rule, which is still haunting English politics a century later. An error of huge and then-unforeseen importance.
SLab, or parts of SLab, can kick and scream all it likes, but with 40% of its supporters backing independence it’ll have to dial down the Union Jackery one way or another.
Partition of Ireland was not vindictive.
A terrible mistake, yes, but not vindictive
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
Partition of a nation where some people wanted to be part of an international union, and others found it an unacceptable infringement of their sovereignty? Perhaps that is where Brexit ends too.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Fomented by leading Tories, indeed.
We need to let Ireland go..... its been nothing but trouble since we invaded.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
Even Kevin O'Higgins, who by no stretch of the imagination could be considered a unionist, said it was understandable if deeply regrettable that the Ulster Protestants had not wished to join a country that had fought a bitter, brutal civil war that had seen the rule of law suspended and whole areas left economic wastelands.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Yes - sort of. What was probable was the creation of an Irish Parliament in Dublin, which it was thought with good reason would lead to armed rebellion in the North. That would ultimately presumably have become a civil war.
'Army intervening on the Protestant side' is more difficult. The army would of course have been used to restore in those circumstances. However, in an incident that assumed rather more significance than perhaps it deserved due to the febrile atmosphere of the times, when an army office called Major Hubert Gough was asked by his superiors whether he would obey any orders to move against Ulster or would resign given the choice, he said that if ordered to attack Protestants he would, but if offered a choice he would resign.
This led to the idea the army could not be trusted to enforce government policy in Ireland, adding seven layers of difficulty to the whole thing.
I think it's pretty clear, isn't it? 1) No 2) Let it burn 3) N/A, but probably No
Corbyn doesn't really do compromise: that's sort of his USP. How do you explain to the enraged Twitter mob of Labour members why Yvette Cooper is suddenly PM and somehow that's democratic? I just don't see how the Labour leadership can implicitly agree with the Tory rebels assertion that even No Deal would be preferable to a Corbyn government.
It's more likely to be why Kenneth Clarke or John Major is suddenly PM. Corbyn can't let them put up a Labour MP for fear that they run away with the ball.
How does he explain that to Labour members? Well, they just STOPPED NO DEAL! And they've got a GENERAL ELECTION! HOORAY!
I think at least in the case of (1) that's easier to explain than why they've just crashed out of the EU when they could have prevented it, and left a right-wing Tory government in power, potentially until 2022, when they could have removed it and got a general election.
He won't even talk to Tory MPs on principle; now he's going to vote for one as Prime Minister, and whip his MPs to do likewise? Well, I'll believe that when I see it. We joke on here about Blairites being as bad as Tories in the eyes of the left, but Corbyn enabling Ken Clarke rather than pushing himself forward really would be quite some betrayal as far as his supporters are concerned. And not an easy thing to explain to supporters on doorsteps in the forthcoming general elections, never mind floating voters: there's a reason why politicians tend not to act in the national interest, and it's because they rarely get rewarded for it.
Corbyn enabling Clarke as 3 week PM to stop no-deal and then fighting as Labour Party Leader would not be seen as a betrayal.
I think it's pretty clear, isn't it? 1) No 2) Let it burn 3) N/A, but probably No
Corbyn doesn't really do compromise: that's sort of his USP. How do you explain to the enraged Twitter mob of Labour members why Yvette Cooper is suddenly PM and somehow that's democratic? I just don't see how the Labour leadership can implicitly agree with the Tory rebels assertion that even No Deal would be preferable to a Corbyn government.
It's more likely to be why Kenneth Clarke or John Major is suddenly PM. Corbyn can't let them put up a Labour MP for fear that they run away with the ball.
How does he explain that to Labour members? Well, they just STOPPED NO DEAL! And they've got a GENERAL ELECTION! HOORAY!
I think at least in the case of (1) that's easier to explain than why they've just crashed out of the EU when they could have prevented it, and left a right-wing Tory government in power, potentially until 2022, when they could have removed it and got a general election.
He won't even talk to Tory MPs on principle; now he's going to vote for one as Prime Minister, and whip his MPs to do likewise? Well, I'll believe that when I see it. We joke on here about Blairites being as bad as Tories in the eyes of the left, but Corbyn enabling Ken Clarke rather than pushing himself forward really would be quite some betrayal as far as his supporters are concerned. And not an easy thing to explain to supporters on doorsteps in the forthcoming general elections, never mind floating voters: there's a reason why politicians tend not to act in the national interest, and it's because they rarely get rewarded for it.
Corbyn enabling Clarke as 3 week PM to stop no-deal and then fighting as Labour Party Leader would not be seen as a betrayal.
And the MP wouldn’t officially be a Tory as they would resign (or be thrown out) the moment they vote down the government in a VoNC
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Fomented by leading Tories, indeed.
We need to let Ireland go..... its been nothing but trouble since we invaded.
Britain would let NI go in an instant. The problem lies with the people there - too many want to stay atm.
Just as scary in the same way to think that a person my age on the day I was born would have been alive before the second World War. I think they probably had a tougher life...
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Isn't his position essentially Cameron's position? (From before 2014)
If Scottish voters elect a majority )
A wild stab at explaining it...Labour has given up on SLAB, concluding they are useless. No prospect of gains. Serious prospect of losing MPs. Along comes Swinson, a Scot, threatening to take away even more votes. The Unionist side is a crowded field. Shift to an ambivalent position. Say you don't HAVE to vote SNP to get Indyref 2. Positioning for both VONC, and next Holyrood election. Have a go at soft pro-Indy votes instead? I said it was a wild stab.
It is even a trend (even more modest) within Lib Dem circles.
Better Together is now recognised as a Tory plot, and a huge elephant trap into which Miliband and Clegg allowed their weak/daft Scottish branches to be lured into. The error will not be repeated. British nationalism is alive and well within Tory hearts, but Labour have lost the appetite for it.
I suspect the travails of Labour’s sister-party in Madrid, vis a vis Catalonia has alerted wiser heads. Madrid has dug itself into a hole and it is going to be one hell of a job getting out of it. Not dissimilar to the vindictive partition of Ireland and subsequent periods of Direct Rule, which is still haunting English politics a century later. An error of huge and then-unforeseen importance.
SLab, or parts of SLab, can kick and scream all it likes, but with 40% of its supporters backing independence it’ll have to dial down the Union Jackery one way or another.
Partition of Ireland was not vindictive.
A terrible mistake, yes, but not vindictive
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
TBF I think the failures were by Gladstone in the 1870s and 1880s not by Lloyd George in the 1910s (although he made mistakes as well)
I wrote a header on it a generation ago (just before IndyRef 1) arguing that lessons from Ireland suggested radical reform was the only way to stave off demands for independence - piecemeal reform just delays things
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Fomented by leading Tories, indeed.
We need to let Ireland go..... its been nothing but trouble since we invaded.
Britain would let NI go in an instant. The problem lies with the people there - too many want to stay atm.
I'm not sure about that, at least with this and the previous government. There wouldn't be an issue with the NI backstop in that case.
(Albeit the current government apparently aims to sabotage ANY agreement with the EU. The backstop becomes a pretext in that case).
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Just as scary in the same way to think that a person my age on the day I was born would have been alive before the second World War. I think they probably had a tougher life...
Absolutely. I remember asking my dad what life had been like in the rocking 60's when I was a child. "bloody hard work with a wife and two kids to feed" was the somewhat unromantic answer.
I was born 16 years after the end of WW2 but there were echoes of it everywhere at that time including old bomb shelters still extant in the parks.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Yes - sort of. What was probable was the creation of an Irish Parliament in Dublin, which it was thought with good reason would lead to armed rebellion in the North. That would ultimately presumably have become a civil war.
'Army intervening on the Protestant side' is more difficult. The army would of course have been used to restore in those circumstances. However, in an incident that assumed rather more significance than perhaps it deserved due to the febrile atmosphere of the times, when an army office called Major Hubert Gough was asked by his superiors whether he would obey any orders to move against Ulster or would resign given the choice, he said that if ordered to attack Protestants he would, but if offered a choice he would resign.
This led to the idea the army could not be trusted to enforce government policy in Ireland, adding seven layers of difficulty to the whole thing.
The Curragh Mutiny was a little more dramatic than that!
Not as fun as the naval gunship that was ordered to Belfast, took a wrong turn and ended up sailing up the Thames...
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Is it rogue? Or is it kite flying?
He does seem to lead the path on a few issues then Corbyn follows.
It seems a very odd kite to fly, especially since he doesn't seem to have warned the SLab leader that he was about to do so.
I think that is arrogance and to feed into the narrative of @malcolmg simply shows McDonnell doesn't care about SLAB's leader.
I don't think that's clear yet either way, but obviously it could easily go pear-shaped and Tory rebels would prefer it if they could do the same job by binding Boris.
The cross-party rebels are returning to ways to block no-deal in law partly because Labour has made it clear it could not support a national unity government formed in the wake of a no-confidence vote.The party would prefer to push for a general election or minority Labour administration led by Jeremy Corbyn as opposed to supporting a compromise candidate such as Yvette Cooper or Ken Clarke.
I mean, obviously they'd *prefer* an early GE or Jeremy Corbyn as PM. But that's not the question. The question is more like one of these:
1) If rebel Tories agreed to vote against their party in a confidence vote, but only on the condition that Labour support a time-limited grandee-led GoNAfaE, would Labour agree to the deal?
2) Alternatively, if a VONC passed, and then the Commons had a vote *rejecting* Jeremy Corbyn as PM, would the Labour leadership agree to instead back a GoNAfaE led by somebody else, or would they leave Boris in place and let it all burn?
3) If the Labour leadership's answer to (2) was to support the grandee, would they be able to bring their leave-supporting MPs with them?
If it got to 2) and Corbyn refused to suport Clarke (say), it is still quite likely that Clarke would be voted in as emergency PM.
Think about this scenario in more detail: The UK government is in gridlock, after 20 Conservatives voted against Johnson's premiership. The HOC needs desperately to find an emergency PM, and Corbyn has been rejected. Corbyn refuses to back Clarke, while Clarke assures the house that he would be PM for three weeks and then enable a GE.
Now how many Tory MPs would in desperation vote for Clarke to get out of this chaos? Many many more than the initial 20 rebels, maybe 100. How many Labour MPs would vote for Clarke against Corbyn's wishes? All except for Corbyn, Hohey and a few extreme Corbyn supporters, so 220 Labour MPs. (Most shadow ministers are prepared to work with Corbyn but are not going to stay on the sinking ship to stay loyal to him.) Add in the SNP, and LDs, PC, and Green and you are way over the 328 needed for the "House to have confidence in Clarke as PM"
Just as scary in the same way to think that a person my age on the day I was born would have been alive before the second World War. I think they probably had a tougher life...
Absolutely. I remember asking my dad what life had been like in the rocking 60's when I was a child. "bloody hard work with a wife and two kids to feed" was the somewhat unromantic answer.
I was born 16 years after the end of WW2 but there were echoes of it everywhere at that time including old bomb shelters still extant in the parks.
A reminiscence of post war Britain It’s funny that when I first watched Call theMidwife I did not realize it was set in the late 1950’s given I was born in 1953 I was shocked when I discovered the actual date and had never realized how poor some parts of the country were.
Corbyn enabling Clarke as 3 week PM to stop no-deal and then fighting as Labour Party Leader would not be seen as a betrayal.
I think that's correct. It's important to understand the motivations and attitudes and I'm perhaps better placed because I know the people involved. Corbyn is perfectly happy to chat to (and indeed vote with) Tories - I've been there when he was doing it - and thinks that personal animosities are unreasonable and a waste of time. It's not that he has a lovely warm nature (I'd call him civilised and level-headed, rather than warm), just that he feels the problem is the capitalist system, not individuals. But his instinct is to argue for his beliefs, not cleverly manoeuvre tactically. He's allergic to cunning plans.
McDonnell wants to win, and is much more of a classic politician, willing to do tactical deals as needed. Talk to the SNP about allowing another referendum? Sure. Do a deal with Clarke? I wouldn't be in the least surprised. Persuade Jeremy to go along with it? Er. Maybe.
Supporters? They'd be fine with that. Focusing on winning the ensuing election would totally preoccupy them.
Just as scary in the same way to think that a person my age on the day I was born would have been alive before the second World War. I think they probably had a tougher life...
Absolutely. I remember asking my dad what life had been like in the rocking 60's when I was a child. "bloody hard work with a wife and two kids to feed" was the somewhat unromantic answer.
I was born 16 years after the end of WW2 but there were echoes of it everywhere at that time including old bomb shelters still extant in the parks.
A friend's mum's comment on the Swinging Sixties (who was a teenager for most of it) was "We didn't see any of it where we lived!"
I mean, obviously they'd *prefer* an early GE or Jeremy Corbyn as PM. But that's not the question. The question is more like one of these:
1) If rebel Tories agreed to vote against their party in a confidence vote, but only on the condition that Labour support a time-limited grandee-led GoNAfaE, would Labour agree to the deal?
2) Alternatively, if a VONC passed, and then the Commons had a vote *rejecting* Jeremy Corbyn as PM, would the Labour leadership agree to instead back a GoNAfaE led by somebody else, or would they leave Boris in place and let it all burn?
3) If the Labour leadership's answer to (2) was to support the grandee, would they be able to bring their leave-supporting MPs with them?
If it got to 2) and Corbyn refused to suport Clarke (say), it is still quite likely that Clarke would be voted in as emergency PM.
Think about this scenario in more detail: The UK government is in gridlock, after 20 Conservatives voted against Johnson's premiership. The HOC needs desperately to find an emergency PM, and Corbyn has been rejected. Corbyn refuses to back Clarke, while Clarke assures the house that he would be PM for three weeks and then enable a GE.
Now how many Tory MPs would in desperation vote for Clarke to get out of this chaos? Many many more than the initial 20 rebels, maybe 100. How many Labour MPs would vote for Clarke against Corbyn's wishes? All except for Corbyn, Hohey and a few extreme Corbyn supporters, so 220 Labour MPs. (Most shadow ministers are prepared to work with Corbyn but are not going to stay on the sinking ship to stay loyal to him.) Add in the SNP, and LDs, PC, and Green and you are way over the 328 needed for the "House to have confidence in Clarke as PM"
There are some heroic assumptions in that. Thus far, most MPs have displayed a marked reluctance to set aside tribal loyalties to anywhere near that extent. They know an election is coming, and I think most will cling to their party as their best hope of re-election.
Just as scary in the same way to think that a person my age on the day I was born would have been alive before the second World War. I think they probably had a tougher life...
Absolutely. I remember asking my dad what life had been like in the rocking 60's when I was a child. "bloody hard work with a wife and two kids to feed" was the somewhat unromantic answer.
I was born 16 years after the end of WW2 but there were echoes of it everywhere at that time including old bomb shelters still extant in the parks.
A friend's mum's comment on the Swinging Sixties (who was a teenager for most of it) was "We didn't see any of it where we lived!"
My dad's response when I asked him about the Sixties "It was depressing, everyone was trying to emigrate".
We were off to Canada in 1967, except the migration visa was turned down because of my mothers health.
I think it's pretty clear, isn't it? 1) No 2) Let it burn 3) N/A, but probably No
Corbyn doesn't really do compromise: that's sort of his USP. How do you explain to the enraged Twitter mob of Labour members why Yvette Cooper is suddenly PM and somehow that's democratic? I just don't see how the Labour leadership can implicitly agree with the Tory rebels assertion that even No Deal would be preferable to a Corbyn government.
It's more likely to be why Kenneth Clarke or John Major is suddenly PM. Corbyn can't let them put up a Labour MP for fear that they run away with the ball.
How does he explain that to Labour members? Well, they just STOPPED NO DEAL! And they've got a GENERAL ELECTION! HOORAY!
I think at least in the case of (1) that's easier to explain than why they've just crashed out of the EU when they could have prevented it, and left a right-wing Tory government in power, potentially until 2022, when they could have removed it and got a general election.
He won't even talk to Tory MPs on principle; now he's going to vote for one as Prime Minister, and whip his MPs to do likewise? Well, I'll believe that when I see it. We joke on here about Blairites being as bad as Tories in the eyes of the left, but Corbyn enabling Ken Clarke rather than pushing himself forward really would be quite some betrayal as far as his supporters are concerned. And not an easy thing to explain to supporters on doorsteps in the forthcoming general elections, never mind floating voters: there's a reason why politicians tend not to act in the national interest, and it's because they rarely get rewarded for it.
Corbyn enabling Clarke as 3 week PM to stop no-deal and then fighting as Labour Party Leader would not be seen as a betrayal.
And the MP wouldn’t officially be a Tory as they would resign (or be thrown out) the moment they vote down the government in a VoNC
I agree if 20 voted against the current Johnson government.
What happens when Johnson has already lost the confidence vote, and a large block of Conservative MPs back Clarke? Would these MPs also lose the whip? That would mean a lot of Conservative constituencies would be scrabbling to find new candidates for general election called a few weeks afterwards, and a lot of high profile ex-Conservative MPs standing for election as independents.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Yes - sort of. What was probable was the creation of an Irish Parliament in Dublin, which it was thought with good reason would lead to armed rebellion in the North. That would ultimately presumably have become a civil war.
'Army intervening on the Protestant side' is more difficult. The army would of course have been used to restore in those circumstances. However, in an incident that assumed rather more significance than perhaps it deserved due to the febrile atmosphere of the times, when an army office called Major Hubert Gough was asked by his superiors whether he would obey any orders to move against Ulster or would resign given the choice, he said that if ordered to attack Protestants he would, but if offered a choice he would resign.
This led to the idea the army could not be trusted to enforce government policy in Ireland, adding seven layers of difficulty to the whole thing.
The Curragh Mutiny was a little more dramatic than that!
Not as fun as the naval gunship that was ordered to Belfast, took a wrong turn and ended up sailing up the Thames...
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Is it rogue? Or is it kite flying?
He does seem to lead the path on a few issues then Corbyn follows.
It seems a very odd kite to fly, especially since he doesn't seem to have warned the SLab leader that he was about to do so.
I think that is arrogance and to feed into the narrative of @malcolmg simply shows McDonnell doesn't care about SLAB's leader.
The penny has finally dropped that Labour's chances of a majority in the assumed-to-be-coming election are close to zero.
If you watch the video it’s not a very positive message!
I have absolutely no memory of that song! 1982 wasn't a good time for me business-wise though, so popular culture wasn't something to which I paid much attention.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Yes - sort of. What was probable was the creation of an Irish Parliament in Dublin, which it was thought with good reason would lead to armed rebellion in the North. That would ultimately presumably have become a civil war.
'Army intervening on the Protestant side' is more difficult. The army would of course have been used to restore in those circumstances. However, in an incident that assumed rather more significance than perhaps it deserved due to the febrile atmosphere of the times, when an army office called Major Hubert Gough was asked by his superiors whether he would obey any orders to move against Ulster or would resign given the choice, he said that if ordered to attack Protestants he would, but if offered a choice he would resign.
This led to the idea the army could not be trusted to enforce government policy in Ireland, adding seven layers of difficulty to the whole thing.
The Curragh Mutiny was a little more dramatic than that!
Not as fun as the naval gunship that was ordered to Belfast, took a wrong turn and ended up sailing up the Thames...
That was a spectacular navigational error!
Not quite as good as the Russian admiral who got rather lost - or very pissed - and thought a load of British trawlers off Dogger Bank were Japanese torpedo boats.
The ramifications of his decision to open fire were - interesting.
I think it's pretty clear, isn't it? 1) No 2) Let it burn 3) N/A, but probably No
Corbyn doesn't really do compromise: that's sort of his USP. How do you explain to the enraged Twitter mob of Labour members why Yvette Cooper is suddenly PM and somehow that's democratic? I just don't see how the Labour leadership can implicitly agree with the Tory rebels assertion that even No Deal would be preferable to a Corbyn government.
It's more likely to be why Kenneth Clarke or John Major is suddenly PM. Corbyn can't let them put up a Labour MP for fear that they run away with the ball.
How does he explain that to Labour members? Well, they just STOPPED NO DEAL! And they've got a GENERAL ELECTION! HOORAY!
I think at least in the case of (1) that's easier to explain than why they've just crashed out of the EU when they could have prevented it, and left a right-wing Tory government in power, potentially until 2022, when they could have removed it and got a general election.
He won't even talk to Tory MPs on principle; now he's going to vote for one as Prime Minister, and whip his MPs to do likewise? Well, I'll believe that when I see it. We joke on here about Blairites being as bad as Tories in the eyes of the left, but Corbyn enabling Ken Clarke rather than pushing himself forward really would be quite some betrayal as far as his supporters are concerned. And not an easy thing to explain to supporters on doorsteps in the forthcoming general elections, never mind floating voters: there's a reason why politicians tend not to act in the national interest, and it's because they rarely get rewarded for it.
Corbyn enabling Clarke as 3 week PM to stop no-deal and then fighting as Labour Party Leader would not be seen as a betrayal.
And the MP wouldn’t officially be a Tory as they would resign (or be thrown out) the moment they vote down the government in a VoNC
I agree if 20 voted against the current Johnson government.
What happens when Johnson has already lost the confidence vote, and a large block of Conservative MPs back Clarke? Would these MPs also lose the whip? That would mean a lot of Conservative constituencies would be scrabbling to find new candidates for general election called a few weeks afterwards, and a lot of high profile ex-Conservative MPs standing for election as independents.
I assume some kind of quick deal would have to do done somehow.
Just as scary in the same way to think that a person my age on the day I was born would have been alive before the second World War. I think they probably had a tougher life...
Absolutely. I remember asking my dad what life had been like in the rocking 60's when I was a child. "bloody hard work with a wife and two kids to feed" was the somewhat unromantic answer.
I was born 16 years after the end of WW2 but there were echoes of it everywhere at that time including old bomb shelters still extant in the parks.
A friend's mum's comment on the Swinging Sixties (who was a teenager for most of it) was "We didn't see any of it where we lived!"
My dad's response when I asked him about the Sixties "It was depressing, everyone was trying to emigrate".
We were off to Canada in 1967, except the migration visa was turned down because of my mothers health.
My dad's response: "I was too busy trying to make a living."
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Yes - sort of. What was probable was the creation of an Irish Parliament in Dublin, which it was thought with good reason would lead to armed rebellion in the North. That would ultimately presumably have become a civil war.
'Army intervening on the Protestant side' is more difficult. The army would of course have been used to restore in those circumstances. However, in an incident that assumed rather more significance than perhaps it deserved due to the febrile atmosphere of the times, when an army office called Major Hubert Gough was asked by his superiors whether he would obey any orders to move against Ulster or would resign given the choice, he said that if ordered to attack Protestants he would, but if offered a choice he would resign.
This led to the idea the army could not be trusted to enforce government policy in Ireland, adding seven layers of difficulty to the whole thing.
The Curragh Mutiny was a little more dramatic than that!
Not as fun as the naval gunship that was ordered to Belfast, took a wrong turn and ended up sailing up the Thames...
That was a spectacular navigational error!
Not quite as good as the Russian admiral who got rather lost - or very pissed - and thought a load of British trawlers off Dogger Bank were Japanese torpedo boats.
The ramifications of his decision to open fire were - interesting.
Highlights the fact that once a ship had left sight of land there was no means of communication with anything, other than with neighbouring ships. The development of marine radio technology was a by-product of that, and the Titanic disaster 8 years later
One that always gets me is the video for the Pet Shop Boys' song, "It's Alright." The video shows them holding a load of babies: all of whom will now be at least 30.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Fomented by leading Tories, indeed.
We need to let Ireland go..... its been nothing but trouble since we invaded.
Britain would let NI go in an instant. The problem lies with the people there - too many want to stay atm.
We could let Fermanagah and Tyrone go to join the Republic tomorrow, they are already majority Catholic with Sinn Fein MPs and voted Remain in the EU referendum .
However in Antrim, the largest county in Northern Ireland, every seat is held by the DUP and those seats also voted Leave in the EU referendum. Rather than let Northern Ireland go what would be more sensible would be a redrawing of the boundaries
If it got to 2) and Corbyn refused to suport Clarke (say), it is still quite likely that Clarke would be voted in as emergency PM.
Think about this scenario in more detail: The UK government is in gridlock, after 20 Conservatives voted against Johnson's premiership. The HOC needs desperately to find an emergency PM, and Corbyn has been rejected. Corbyn refuses to back Clarke, while Clarke assures the house that he would be PM for three weeks and then enable a GE.
Now how many Tory MPs would in desperation vote for Clarke to get out of this chaos? Many many more than the initial 20 rebels, maybe 100. How many Labour MPs would vote for Clarke against Corbyn's wishes? All except for Corbyn, Hohey and a few extreme Corbyn supporters, so 220 Labour MPs. (Most shadow ministers are prepared to work with Corbyn but are not going to stay on the sinking ship to stay loyal to him.) Add in the SNP, and LDs, PC, and Green and you are way over the 328 needed for the "House to have confidence in Clarke as PM"
No. If this happens we are in countdown to a General Election. If a vote endorsing Clarke occurs the General Election is cancelled [or delayed at least] as the clock gets stopped.
Any Labour MP who voted for Clarke would be told they will lose the whip. The number of Labour MPs who vote for Clarke then would be zero.
There might be a number of recently ex-Labour MPs who resign the whip in the face of a General Election to vote for Clarke but you can probably count that number on your fingers it won't be 220.
Yes - sort of. What was probable was the creation of an Irish Parliament in Dublin, which it was thought with good reason would lead to armed rebellion in the North. That would ultimately presumably have become a civil war.
'Army intervening on the Protestant side' is more difficult. The army would of course have been used to restore in those circumstances. However, in an incident that assumed rather more significance than perhaps it deserved due to the febrile atmosphere of the times, when an army office called Major Hubert Gough was asked by his superiors whether he would obey any orders to move against Ulster or would resign given the choice, he said that if ordered to attack Protestants he would, but if offered a choice he would resign.
This led to the idea the army could not be trusted to enforce government policy in Ireland, adding seven layers of difficulty to the whole thing.
The Curragh Mutiny was a little more dramatic than that!
Not as fun as the naval gunship that was ordered to Belfast, took a wrong turn and ended up sailing up the Thames...
That was a spectacular navigational error!
Not quite as good as the Russian admiral who got rather lost - or very pissed - and thought a load of British trawlers off Dogger Bank were Japanese torpedo boats.
The ramifications of his decision to open fire were - interesting.
Highlights the fact that once a ship had left sight of land there was no means of communication with anything, other than with neighbouring ships. The development of marine radio technology was a by-product of that, and the Titanic disaster 8 years later
The whole voyage was a pinnacle of incompetence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogger_Bank_incident I particularly liked: "The Kamchatka eventually rejoined the fleet and claimed that she had engaged three Japanese warships and fired over 300 shells: the ships she had actually fired at were a Swedish merchantman, a German trawler, and a French schooner" and that one of the ships reportedly fired over 500 shells without hitting anything.
Their rapid defeat in the Sea of Japan could hardly have been a surprise.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Fomented by leading Tories, indeed.
We need to let Ireland go..... its been nothing but trouble since we invaded.
Britain would let NI go in an instant. The problem lies with the people there - too many want to stay atm.
We could let Fermanagah and Tyrone go to join the Republic tomorrow, they are already majority Catholic with Sinn Fein MPs and voted Remain in the EU referendum .
However in Antrim, the largest county in Northern Ireland, every seat is held by the DUP and those seats also voted Leave in the EU referendum. Rather than let Northern Ireland go what would be more sensible would be a redrawing of the boundaries
We are not going to divide or redraw the boundaries, that is ridiculous. Either NI stays or NI goes.
Not been around for a few days but I see theres been an exodus from the PB Tories. Inevitable given current politics but I respect deeply when people do not allow tribal loyalty to lead them to stay even when theres no longer any shared views on critical issues. They can always still vote for the party if it is a least worst situation, and staying and fighting works up to a point, but when things change you have to react.
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Isn't his position essentially Cameron's position? (From before 2014)
If Scottish voters elect a majority of representatives on a platform for another referendum and those representatives vote for that in Holyrood then he would not stand in their way. (With the change of the word "a" to "another")
There's a big difference between Cameron's position for a once-in-a-generation referendum, and supporting holding another referendum just a few years later. However, my point wasn't about the merits or justification of the idea, but about the politics, and the timing. Why provoke a completely unnecessary row and alienate your own Scottish party? And why now? Surely this was a sleeping dog which could have been left snoring in the corner.
A wild stab at explaining it...Labour has given up on SLAB, concluding they are useless. No prospect of gains. Serious prospect of losing MPs. tab.
Astute.
The signs are modest, but they are there: Labour is moving slowly but steadily away from the rampant British nationalism of Better Together and towards adopting a pretty-much neutral position on Scottish independence. Folk like Ian Murray know it and are incandescent.
It is even a trend (even more modest) within Lib Dem circles.
Better Together is now recognised as a Tory plot, and a huge elephant trap into which Miliband and Clegg allowed their weak/daft Scottish branches to be lured into. The error will not be repeated. British nationalism is alive and well within Tory hearts, but Labour have lost the appetite for it.
I suspect the travails of Labour’s sister-party in Madrid, vis a vis Catalonia has alerted wiser heads. Madrid has dug itself into a hole and it is going to be one hell of a job getting out of it. Not dissimilar to the vindictive partition of Ireland and subsequent periods of Direct Rule, which is still haunting English politics a century later. An error of huge and then-unforeseen importance.
SLab, or parts of SLab, can kick and scream all it likes, but with 40% of its supporters backing independence it’ll have to dial down the Union Jackery one way or another.
Yet with 60% of Slab supporters still backing the Union it cannot abandon the Union Jack either or Davidson and Swinson will pounce
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Fomented by leading Tories, indeed.
We need to let Ireland go..... its been nothing but trouble since we invaded.
Britain would let NI go in an instant. The problem lies with the people there - too many want to stay atm.
We could let Fermanagah and Tyrone go to join the Republic tomorrow, they are already majority Catholic with Sinn Fein MPs and voted Remain in the EU referendum .
However in Antrim, the largest county in Northern Ireland, every seat is held by the DUP and those seats also voted Leave in the EU referendum. Rather than let Northern Ireland go what would be more sensible would be a redrawing of the boundaries
We are not going to divide or redraw the boundaries, that is ridiculous. Either NI stays or NI goes.
Or has a civil war if the boundaries are not redrawn
I think it's pretty clear, isn't it? 1) No 2) Let it burn 3) N/A, but probably No
Corbyn doesn't really do compromise: that's sort of his USP. How do you explain to the enraged Twitter mob of Labour members why Yvette Cooper is suddenly PM and somehow that's democratic? I just don't see how the Labour leadership can implicitly agree with the Tory rebels assertion that even No Deal would be preferable to a Corbyn government.
It's more likely to be why Kenneth Clarke or John Major is suddenly PM. Corbyn can't let them put up a Labour MP for fear that they run away with the ball.
How does he explain that to Labour members? Well, they just STOPPED NO DEAL! And they've got a GENERAL ELECTION! HOORAY!
I think at least in the case of (1) that's easier to explain than why they've just crashed out of the EU when they could have prevented it, and left a right-wing Tory government in power, potentially until 2022, when they could have removed it and got a general election.
He won't even talk to Tory MPs on principle; now he's going to vote for one as Prime Minister, and whip his MPs to do likewise? Well, I'll believe that when I see it. We joke on here about Blairites being as bad as Tories in the eyes of the left, but Corbyn enabling Ken Clarke rather than pushing himself forward really would be quite some betrayal as far as his supporters are concerned. And not an easy thing to explain to supporters on doorsteps in the forthcoming general elections, never mind floating voters: there's a reason why politicians tend not to act in the national interest, and it's because they rarely get rewarded for it.
Corbyn enabling Clarke as 3 week PM to stop no-deal and then fighting as Labour Party Leader would not be seen as a betrayal.
And the MP wouldn’t officially be a Tory as they would resign (or be thrown out) the moment they vote down the government in a VoNC
I agree if 20 voted against the current Johnson government.
What happens when Johnson has already lost the confidence vote, and a large block of Conservative MPs back Clarke? Would these MPs also lose the whip? That would mean a lot of Conservative constituencies would be scrabbling to find new candidates for general election called a few weeks afterwards, and a lot of high profile ex-Conservative MPs standing for election as independents.
Uncertainty - in the face of which most people cling to the familiar.
Yes - sort of. What was probable was the creation of an Irish Parliament in Dublin, which it was thought with good reason would lead to armed rebellion in the North. That would ultimately presumably have become a civil war.
'Army intervening on the Protestant side' is more difficult. The army would of course have been used to restore in those circumstances. However, in an incident that assumed rather more significance than perhaps it deserved due to the febrile atmosphere of the times, when an army office called Major Hubert Gough was asked by his superiors whether he would obey any orders to move against Ulster or would resign given the choice, he said that if ordered to attack Protestants he would, but if offered a choice he would resign.
This led to the idea the army could not be trusted to enforce government policy in Ireland, adding seven layers of difficulty to the whole thing.
The Curragh Mutiny was a little more dramatic than that!
Not as fun as the naval gunship that was ordered to Belfast, took a wrong turn and ended up sailing up the Thames...
That was a spectacular navigational error!
Not quite as good as the Russian admiral who got rather lost - or very pissed - and thought a load of British trawlers off Dogger Bank were Japanese torpedo boats.
The ramifications of his decision to open fire were - interesting.
Highlights the fact that once a ship had left sight of land there was no means of communication with anything, other than with neighbouring ships. The development of marine radio technology was a by-product of that, and the Titanic disaster 8 years later
The whole voyage was a pinnacle of incompetence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogger_Bank_incident I particularly liked: "The Kamchatka eventually rejoined the fleet and claimed that she had engaged three Japanese warships and fired over 300 shells: the ships she had actually fired at were a Swedish merchantman, a German trawler, and a French schooner" and that one of the ships reportedly fired over 500 shells without hitting anything.
Their rapid defeat in the Sea of Japan could hardly have been a surprise.
A wild stab at explaining it...Labour has given up on SLAB, concluding they are useless. No prospect of gains. Serious prospect of losing MPs. tab.
Astute.
The signs are modest, but they are there: Labour is moving slowly but steadily away from the rampant British nationalism of Better Together and towards adopting a pretty-much neutral position on Scottish independence. Folk like Ian Murray know it and are incandescent.
It is even a trend (even more modest) within Lib Dem circles.
Better Together is now recognised as a Tory plot, and a huge elephant trap into which Miliband and Clegg allowed their weak/daft Scottish branches to be lured into. The error will not be repeated. British nationalism is alive and well within Tory hearts, but Labour have lost the appetite for it.
I suspect the travails of Labour’s sister-party in Madrid, vis a vis Catalonia has alerted wiser heads. Madrid has dug itself into a hole and it is going to be one hell of a job getting out of it. Not dissimilar to the vindictive partition of Ireland and subsequent periods of Direct Rule, which is still haunting English politics a century later. An error of huge and then-unforeseen importance.
SLab, or parts of SLab, can kick and scream all it likes, but with 40% of its supporters backing independence it’ll have to dial down the Union Jackery one way or another.
Yet with 60% of Slab supporters still backing the Union it cannot abandon the Union Jack either or Davidson and Swinson will pounce
The comment made to me at the time was Better Together is where Labour stalwarts taught Tories how to fight an election and win, something they had long since forgotten. There was undoubtedly some truth in that but describing it as a "Tory plot" or an "elephant trap" is a bit silly.
One that always gets me is the video for the Pet Shop Boys' song, "It's Alright." The video shows them holding a load of babies: all of whom will now be at least 30.
I occasionally reflect that when I was born it was roughly only 20 years after the War. That's like saying that today in 2019, the War finished in 2000.
I had no memory of it obviously, but everyone around me from the two generations above me, must have had relatively fresh memories of it.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Fomented by leading Tories, indeed.
We need to let Ireland go..... its been nothing but trouble since we invaded.
Britain would let NI go in an instant. The problem lies with the people there - too many want to stay atm.
We could let Fermanagah and Tyrone go to join the Republic tomorrow, they are already majority Catholic with Sinn Fein MPs and voted Remain in the EU referendum .
However in Antrim, the largest county in Northern Ireland, every seat is held by the DUP and those seats also voted Leave in the EU referendum. Rather than let Northern Ireland go what would be more sensible would be a redrawing of the boundaries
We are not going to divide or redraw the boundaries, that is ridiculous. Either NI stays or NI goes.
Or has a civil war if the boundaries are not redrawn
Controversial opinion: Come on Eileen is objectively the better song. People are only saying “Geno” because Come On Eileen has been destroyed by over-playing.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Fomented by leading Tories, indeed.
We need to let Ireland go..... its been nothing but trouble since we invaded.
Britain would let NI go in an instant. The problem lies with the people there - too many want to stay atm.
We could let Fermanagah and Tyrone go to join the Republic tomorrow, they are already majority Catholic with Sinn Fein MPs and voted Remain in the EU referendum .
However in Antrim, the largest county in Northern Ireland, every seat is held by the DUP and those seats also voted Leave in the EU referendum. Rather than let Northern Ireland go what would be more sensible would be a redrawing of the boundaries
We are not going to divide or redraw the boundaries, that is ridiculous. Either NI stays or NI goes.
Or has a civil war if the boundaries are not redrawn
No.
You obviously do not understand its history, NI was created to avoid a civil war.
Loyalist paramilitaries, the Orange Order etc would not accept being forced out of the UK
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Is it rogue? Or is it kite flying?
He does seem to lead the path on a few issues then Corbyn follows.
It seems a very odd kite to fly, especially since he doesn't seem to have warned the SLab leader that he was about to do so.
I think that is arrogance and to feed into the narrative of @malcolmg simply shows McDonnell doesn't care about SLAB's leader.
It is called democracy, McDonnell understands the Law and knows you cannot keep people in slavery any more. They are entitled to a vote of self determination. It is not the purview of any Westminster politician to dictate when Scotland has a vote on the constitutional question. While the matter may be reserved in terms of constitution, UK law is SUBORDINATE to international law and to international treaties. So important is the right to self-determination the the United Nations made it the first paragraph of the first article in the first part of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights ratified by resolution 2200A (XXI) of 16 December 1966under article 49. In states: "All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development."
One that always gets me is the video for the Pet Shop Boys' song, "It's Alright." The video shows them holding a load of babies: all of whom will now be at least 30.
I occasionally reflect that when I was born it was roughly only 20 years after the War. That's like saying that today in 2019, the War finished in 2000.
I had no memory of it obviously, but everyone around me from the two generations above me, must have had relatively fresh memories of it.
I'm a relative young'un in these parts being a child of the early 80s, but its remarkable to make me think that when I was a child at school we had veterans from WWI still with us and veterans of WWII where everywhere.
Now my children are very young but they when they grow up won't really remember veterans of even WWII.
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Is it rogue? Or is it kite flying?
He does seem to lead the path on a few issues then Corbyn follows.
It seems a very odd kite to fly, especially since he doesn't seem to have warned the SLab leader that he was about to do so.
I think that is arrogance and to feed into the narrative of @malcolmg simply shows McDonnell doesn't care about SLAB's leader.
It is called democracy, McDonnell understands the Law and knows you cannot keep people in slavery any more. They are entitled to a vote of self determination. It is not the purview of any Westminster politician to dictate when Scotland has a vote on the constitutional question. While the matter may be reserved in terms of constitution, UK law is SUBORDINATE to international law and to international treaties. So important is the right to self-determination the the United Nations made it the first paragraph of the first article in the first part of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights ratified by resolution 2200A (XXI) of 16 December 1966under article 49. In states: "All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development."
It is not the settled will of the Scottish people - yet - to be independent, and any referendum at this stage is just banana republic stuff.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Fomented by leading Tories, indeed.
We need to let Ireland go..... its been nothing but trouble since we invaded.
Britain would let NI go in an instant. The problem lies with the people there - too many want to stay atm.
We could let Fermanagah and Tyrone go to join the Republic tomorrow, they are already majority Catholic with Sinn Fein MPs and voted Remain in the EU referendum .
However in Antrim, the largest county in Northern Ireland, every seat is held by the DUP and those seats also voted Leave in the EU referendum. Rather than let Northern Ireland go what would be more sensible would be a redrawing of the boundaries
We are not going to divide or redraw the boundaries, that is ridiculous. Either NI stays or NI goes.
Or has a civil war if the boundaries are not redrawn
No.
You obviously do not understand its history, NI was created to avoid a civil war.
Loyalist paramilitaries, the Orange Order etc would not accept being forced out of the UK
No you obviously do not understand its history
Yes they will have to accept it and they will not have a choice. If the UK leaves NI then the Orange Order will have no more to say about that than people in Hong Kong did. The UK and Ireland have both already agreed that the future of NI will be decided democratically and nobody has any interest in redrawing boundaries.
If a majority vote to join Ireland then the UK will say thank you, good luck and goodbye. The Orange Order can do as it pleases, we will be out.
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Is it rogue? Or is it kite flying?
He does seem to lead the path on a few issues then Corbyn follows.
It seems a very odd kite to fly, especially since he doesn't seem to have warned the SLab leader that he was about to do so.
I think that is arrogance and to feed into the narrative of @malcolmg simply shows McDonnell doesn't care about SLAB's leader.
It is called democracy, McDonnell understands the Law and knows you cannot keep people in slavery any more. They are entitled to a vote of self determination. It is not the purview of any Westminster politician to dictate when Scotland has a vote on the constitutional question. While the matter may be reserved in terms of constitution, UK law is SUBORDINATE to international law and to international treaties. So important is the right to self-determination the the United Nations made it the first paragraph of the first article in the first part of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights ratified by resolution 2200A (XXI) of 16 December 1966under article 49. In states: "All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development."
I think you misread that, nowhere does it say that there is a right to have votes repeatedly - in fact look at Catalonia which Remainers are happy to have Madrid as part of their union setting our laws, they didn't even get a first vote..
Scots have had that once-in-a-lifetime vote of self-determination. There is no requirement, much as I would want it, for Westminster to agree a second. Good luck fighting it in an international court.
Yes - sort of. What was probable was the creation of an Irish Parliament in Dublin, which it was thought with good reason would lead to armed rebellion in the North. That would ultimately presumably have become a civil war.
'Army intervening on the Protestant side' is more difficult. The army would of course have been used to restore in those circumstances. However, in an incident that assumed rather more significance than perhaps it deserved due to the febrile atmosphere of the times, when an army office called Major Hubert Gough was asked by his superiors whether he would obey any orders to move against Ulster or would resign given the choice, he said that if ordered to attack Protestants he would, but if offered a choice he would resign.
This led to the idea the army could not be trusted to enforce government policy in Ireland, adding seven layers of difficulty to the whole thing.
The Curragh Mutiny was a little more dramatic than that!
Not as fun as the naval gunship that was ordered to Belfast, took a wrong turn and ended up sailing up the Thames...
That was a spectacular navigational error!
Not quite as good as the Russian admiral who got rather lost - or very pissed - and thought a load of British trawlers off Dogger Bank were Japanese torpedo boats.
The ramifications of his decision to open fire were - interesting.
Highlights the fact that once a ship had left sight of land there was no means of communication with anything, other than with neighbouring ships. The development of marine radio technology was a by-product of that, and the Titanic disaster 8 years later
The whole voyage was a pinnacle of incompetence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogger_Bank_incident I particularly liked: "The Kamchatka eventually rejoined the fleet and claimed that she had engaged three Japanese warships and fired over 300 shells: the ships she had actually fired at were a Swedish merchantman, a German trawler, and a French schooner" and that one of the ships reportedly fired over 500 shells without hitting anything.
Their rapid defeat in the Sea of Japan could hardly have been a surprise.
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Is it rogue? Or is it kite flying?
He does seem to lead the path on a few issues then Corbyn follows.
It seems a very odd kite to fly, especially since he doesn't seem to have warned the SLab leader that he was about to do so.
I think that is arrogance and to feed into the narrative of @malcolmg simply shows McDonnell doesn't care about SLAB's leader.
It is called democracy, McDonnell understands the Law and knows you cannot keep people in slavery any more. They are entitled to a vote of self determination. It is not the purview of any Westminster politician to dictate when Scotland has a vote on the constitutional question. While the matter may be reserved in terms of constitution, UK law is SUBORDINATE to international law and to international treaties. So important is the right to self-determination the the United Nations made it the first paragraph of the first article in the first part of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights ratified by resolution 2200A (XXI) of 16 December 1966under article 49. In states: "All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development."
It is not the settled will of the Scottish people - yet - to be independent, and any referendum at this stage is just banana republic stuff.
LOL, a majority in the Scottish Parliament have voted for a referendum, which means it should by law be put to the people. It is not for any Westminster carpetbagger to decide whether or not there is a vote. The UK is acting like a banana republic and cannot win in the end, they are international pariahs as it is.
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Is it rogue? Or is it kite flying?
He does seem to lead the path on a few issues then Corbyn follows.
It seems a very odd kite to fly, especially since he doesn't seem to have warned the SLab leader that he was about to do so.
I think that is arrogance and to feed into the narrative of @malcolmg simply shows McDonnell doesn't care about SLAB's leader.
It is called democracy, McDonnell understands the Law and knows you cannot keep people in slavery any more. They are entitled to a vote of self determination. It is not the purview of any Westminster politician to dictate when Scotland has a vote on the constitutional question. While the matter may be reserved in terms of constitution, UK law is SUBORDINATE to international law and to international treaties. So important is the right to self-determination the the United Nations made it the first paragraph of the first article in the first part of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights ratified by resolution 2200A (XXI) of 16 December 1966under article 49. In states: "All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development."
I think you misread that, nowhere does it say that there is a right to have votes repeatedly - in fact look at Catalonia which Remainers are happy to have Madrid as part of their union setting our laws, they didn't even get a first vote..
Scots have had that once-in-a-lifetime vote of self-determination. There is no requirement, much as I would want it, for Westminster to agree a second. Good luck fighting it in an international court.
Can you quote which law or treaty states it is a once in a lifetime choice. Westminster have no say in the matter , it is a question for the people of Scotland, you fascists do not seem to understand the first thing about democracy.
The Curragh Mutiny was a little more dramatic than that!
Not as fun as the naval gunship that was ordered to Belfast, took a wrong turn and ended up sailing up the Thames...
That was a spectacular navigational error!
Not quite as good as the Russian admiral who got rather lost - or very pissed - and thought a load of British trawlers off Dogger Bank were Japanese torpedo boats.
The ramifications of his decision to open fire were - interesting.
Highlights the fact that once a ship had left sight of land there was no means of communication with anything, other than with neighbouring ships. The development of marine radio technology was a by-product of that, and the Titanic disaster 8 years later
The whole voyage was a pinnacle of incompetence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogger_Bank_incident I particularly liked: "The Kamchatka eventually rejoined the fleet and claimed that she had engaged three Japanese warships and fired over 300 shells: the ships she had actually fired at were a Swedish merchantman, a German trawler, and a French schooner" and that one of the ships reportedly fired over 500 shells without hitting anything.
Their rapid defeat in the Sea of Japan could hardly have been a surprise.
How on earth did they imagine the Japanese could have a squadron of torpedo boats stationed on the other side of the globe ?
I see the nature of official enquiries has not greatly changed in the last century or so... The report produced by the International Commission concluded that: "the commissioners declare that their findings, which are therein formulated, are not, in their opinion, of a nature to cast any discredit upon the military qualities or the humanity of Admiral Rojdestvensky, or of the personnel of his squadron". It also concluded as follows: "the commissioners take pleasure in recognising, unanimously, that Admiral Rozhestvensky personally did everything he could, from beginning to end of the incident, to prevent trawlers, recognised as such, from being fired upon by the squadron"
The best solution looking at the Remain /Leave map is for the three Remain areas to go it alone. London-Scotland -Ireland. All this effort to accomodate Stoke and Hartlepool and Boston and Castle Point and Thurrock etc seems such a waste of energy. If they want to spend their lives with like minded people that's fine.
Corbyn enabling Clarke as 3 week PM to stop no-deal and then fighting as Labour Party Leader would not be seen as a betrayal.
I think that's correct. It's important to understand the motivations and attitudes and I'm perhaps better placed because I know the people involved. Corbyn is perfectly happy to chat to (and indeed vote with) Tories - I've been there when he was doing it - and thinks that personal animosities are unreasonable and a waste of time. It's not that he has a lovely warm nature (I'd call him civilised and level-headed, rather than warm), just that he feels the problem is the capitalist system, not individuals. But his instinct is to argue for his beliefs, not cleverly manoeuvre tactically. He's allergic to cunning plans.
McDonnell wants to win, and is much more of a classic politician, willing to do tactical deals as needed. Talk to the SNP about allowing another referendum? Sure. Do a deal with Clarke? I wouldn't be in the least surprised. Persuade Jeremy to go along with it? Er. Maybe.
Supporters? They'd be fine with that. Focusing on winning the ensuing election would totally preoccupy them.
I defer to your superior knowledge of the individuals involved, and it seems a fair assessment from my more distant vantage point. One additional point: I think you're thinking about the traditional Labour supporters who helped you and your former colleagues get elected back in the day, and you're probably right that they'd swallow a renegade Tory as PM for a bit to get a shot at a proper Labour majority. However, my perception is very much that the newer vintage are far less reasonable on issues such as betrayal. Which is how that would undoubtedly be interpreted.
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Is it rogue? Or is it kite flying?
He does seem to lead the path on a few issues then Corbyn follows.
It seems a very odd kite to fly, especially since he doesn't seem to have warned the SLab leader that he was about to do so.
I think that is arrogance and to feed into the narrative of @malcolmg simply shows McDonnell doesn't care about SLAB's leader.
It is called democracy, McDonnell understands the Law and knows you cannot keep people in slavery any more. They are entitled to a vote of self determination. It is not the purview of any Westminster politician to dictate when Scotland has a vote on the constitutional question. While the matter may be reserved in terms of constitution, UK law is SUBORDINATE to international law and to international treaties. So important is the right to self-determination the the United Nations made it the first paragraph of the first article in the first part of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights ratified by resolution 2200A (XXI) of 16 December 1966under article 49. In states: "All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development."
I think you misread that, nowhere does it say that there is a right to have votes repeatedly - in fact look at Catalonia which Remainers are happy to have Madrid as part of their union setting our laws, they didn't even get a first vote..
Scots have had that once-in-a-lifetime vote of self-determination. There is no requirement, much as I would want it, for Westminster to agree a second. Good luck fighting it in an international court.
Can you quote which law or treaty states it is a once in a lifetime choice. Westminster have no say in the matter , it is a question for the people of Scotland, you fascists do not seem to understand the first thing about democracy.
I think Phil is working up to HYUFD's position of sending in the army to quell the rebellion and arrest the ringleaders...
I was born in Hull in 1959 and the effects of the German bombing were still visible throughout my childhood. Listening to my mother talk about the bombing is deeply moving; she tells of the mornings in school, waiting to see who didn’t turn up when bombs had fallen nearby.
There was a BBC documentary on the Hull experience a couple of years ago. Near the start, a map is shown of the impacts of bombs. I was stunned to see how many had landed during the whole war on the part of the city where I grew up. Then the presenter revealed that the map was for just one night of the blitz.
Controversial opinion: Come on Eileen is objectively the better song. People are only saying “Geno” because Come On Eileen has been destroyed by over-playing.
Could only be more wrong if you said "Come on Eileen is nearly as good as Radiohead"
Can you quote which law or treaty states it is a once in a lifetime choice. Westminster have no say in the matter , it is a question for the people of Scotland, you fascists do not seem to understand the first thing about democracy.
The Scottish government's white paper said it didn't it?
Can you tell me, if Westminster refuses to grant a second vote, in which court you would fight that based on international law? And why the Catalans haven't already done that? Whether you like it or not it is a reserved matter so Westminster absolutely has a say, as the SNP tacitly agreed when they made the agreement with Westminster last time.
Not sure why you're calling me a fascist when I want you to be able to have a second vote and I want you to win it. Realpolitik however means you don't need to just convince Holyrood, you need a majority in Westminster too.
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Is it rogue? Or is it kite flying?
He does seem to lead the path on a few issues then Corbyn follows.
It seems a very odd kite to fly, especially since he doesn't seem to have warned the SLab leader that he was about to do so.
I think that is arrogance and to feed into the narrative of @malcolmg simply shows McDonnell doesn't care about SLAB's leader.
It is called democracy, McDonnell understands the Law and knows you cannot keep people in slavery any more. They are entitled to a vote of self determination. It is not the purview of any Westminster politician to dictate when Scotland has a vote on the constitutional question. While the matter may be reserved in terms of constitution, UK law is SUBORDINATE to international law and to international treaties. So important is the right to self-determination the the United Nations made it the first paragraph of the first article in the first part of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights ratified by resolution 2200A (XXI) of 16 December 1966under article 49. In states: "All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development."
As a matter of law, all of that is a bit of a stretch - but as a matter of practical politics, you're probably right.
O/T The Labour row over John McDonnell's remarks on IndyRef2 is bizarre. What is going on? Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up some flim-flam to keep options open on this? It looks as though McDonnell - previously very disciplined - has gone rogue.
Is it rogue? Or is it kite flying?
He does seem to lead the path on a few issues then Corbyn follows.
It seems a very odd kite to fly, especially since he doesn't seem to have warned the SLab leader that he was about to do so.
I think that is arrogance and to feed into the narrative of @malcolmg simply shows McDonnell doesn't care about SLAB's leader.
It is called democracy, McDonnell understands the Law and knows you cannot keep people in slavery any more. They are entitled to a vote of self determination. It is not the purview of any Westminster politician to dictate when Scotland has a vote on the constitutional question. While the matter may be reserved in terms of constitution, UK law is SUBORDINATE to international law and to international treaties. So important is the right to self-determination the the United Nations made it the first paragraph of the first article in the first part of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights ratified by resolution 2200A (XXI) of 16 December 1966under article 49. In states: "All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development."
I think you misread that, nowhere does it say that there is a right to have votes repeatedly - in fact look at Catalonia which Remainers are happy to have Madrid as part of their union setting our laws, they didn't even get a first vote..
Scots have had that once-in-a-lifetime vote of self-determination. There is no requirement, much as I would want it, for Westminster to agree a second. Good luck fighting it in an international court.
Can you quote which law or treaty states it is a once in a lifetime choice. Westminster have no say in the matter , it is a question for the people of Scotland, you fascists do not seem to understand the first thing about democracy.
I think Phil is working up to HYUFD's position of sending in the army to quell the rebellion and arrest the ringleaders...
I was born in Hull in 1959 and the effects of the German bombing were still visible throughout my childhood. Listening to my mother talk about the bombing is deeply moving; she tells of the mornings in school, waiting to see who didn’t turn up when bombs had fallen nearby.
There was a BBC documentary on the Hull experience a couple of years ago. Near the start, a map is shown of the impacts of bombs. I was stunned to see how many had landed on the part of the city where I grew up during the war. Then the presenter revealed that the map was for just one night of the blitz.
A dear friend's dad grew up in Hull during the war. He described little bomblets disguised as little mechanical toys (?butterfly bombs?), which children would pick up ...
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Fomented by leading Tories, indeed.
We need to let Ireland go..... its been nothing but trouble since we invaded.
Britain would let NI go in an instant. The problem lies with the people there - too many want to stay atm.
We could let Fermanagah and Tyrone go to join the Republic tomorrow, they are already majority Catholic with Sinn Fein MPs and voted Remain in the EU referendum .
However in Antrim, the largest county in Northern Ireland, every seat is held by the DUP and those seats also voted Leave in the EU referendum. Rather than let Northern Ireland go what would be more sensible would be a redrawing of the boundaries
We are not going to divide or redraw the boundaries, that is ridiculous. Either NI stays or NI goes.
Or has a civil war if the boundaries are not redrawn
No.
You obviously do not understand its history, NI was created to avoid a civil war.
Loyalist paramilitaries, the Orange Order etc would not accept being forced out of the UK
Aided and abetted by the Tory traitors, of course, who were opposed to the Liberal proposals for home rule for Ireland. Another missed opportunity, thanks to the stupidity and short-sightedness of the Conservatives. History repeats itself.
If we are doing random naval anecdotes, my favourite was the German warship that turned up at Easter Island several months after the outbreak of World War One. News of the conflict hadn't reached the port there which had a British depot. They simply bought the coal, food and water they needed and left after having paid by cheque. The cheque was duly lodged and honoured.
I was born in Hull in 1959 and the effects of the German bombing were still visible throughout my childhood. Listening to my mother talk about the bombing is deeply moving; she tells of the mornings in school, waiting to see who didn’t turn up when bombs had fallen nearby.
There was a BBC documentary on the Hull experience a couple of years ago. Near the start, a map is shown of the impacts of bombs. I was stunned to see how many had landed during the whole war on the part of the city where I grew up. Then the presenter revealed that the map was for just one night of the blitz.
Given the situation in Ireland in the early 20th Century, and the height at which passions, especially in the Protestant community were running, it's perhaps understandable, though. That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
I think the it is because people's focus was on other things - something like WW1.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
Ydoethur might well correct me, but my understanding is that had it not been for WWI there might well have been a Protestant vs Catholic civil war in Ireland by about 1915. With some at least of the British Army intervening on the Protestant side. "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
Fomented by leading Tories, indeed.
We need to let Ireland go..... its been nothing but trouble since we invaded.
Britain would let NI go in an instant. The problem lies with the people there - too many want to stay atm.
We could let Fermanagah and Tyrone go to join the Republic tomorrow, they are already majority Catholic with Sinn Fein MPs and voted Remain in the EU referendum .
However in Antrim, the largest county in Northern Ireland, every seat is held by the DUP and those seats also voted Leave in the EU referendum. Rather than let Northern Ireland go what would be more sensible would be a redrawing of the boundaries
We are not going to divide or redraw the boundaries, that is ridiculous. Either NI stays or NI goes.
Or has a civil war if the boundaries are not redrawn
No.
NI was created to avoid a civil war a century ago with Protestants in the North of Ireland prepared to fight a civil war rather than be forced into the newly created Irish Free State against their will.
Loyalist paramilitaries, the Orange Order etc would not accept being forced out of the UK against their will and Fermanagah and Tyrone and the Real IRA etc would not accept a hard border in Ireland either so a redrawing of the boundaries it has to be.
Northern Ireland has only had peace since the Troubles under the Good Friday Agreement as Protestant Unionists were still part of the UK and Catholic Nationalists had an open border with the Republic of Ireland so felt no division (though I know Boris will try and avoid a hard border if No Deal)
The best solution looking at the Remain /Leave map is for the three Remain areas to go it alone. London-Scotland -Ireland. All this effort to accomodate Stoke and Hartlepool and Boston and Castle Point and Thurrock etc seems such a waste of energy. If they want to spend their lives with like minded people that's fine.
What about Dagenham, Hillingdon, Sutton, Bexley, Havering, Antrim and Down which voted Leave, presumably they can leave EU London and an expanded Irish Republic and stay in the Brexit UK?
Comments
We just have to hope that this time someone does blink.
It doesn’t have to get taken at all. And probably won’t. There is a good reason for the Speaker to take a formal VONC, and good reason to take notions like yours during the 14-day period. But not out of the blue just to fill an otherwise boring afternoon.
That 'it' was allowed to get to that state is a very severe criticism of statecraft at the time.
Hope it isn't Warren. A Biden/Harris final two would be ideal for me.
Sees the same arguments going around in the same circles as three days ago, with almost everyone starting from their preferred Brexit conclusion and working backwards, thus generating way more heat than light.
Goes back to lurking for a while longer.
And by the time that ended it was already too late for those who had done nothing for years due to WW1 to resolve issues
"Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right!"
'Army intervening on the Protestant side' is more difficult. The army would of course have been used to restore in those circumstances. However, in an incident that assumed rather more significance than perhaps it deserved due to the febrile atmosphere of the times, when an army office called Major Hubert Gough was asked by his superiors whether he would obey any orders to move against Ulster or would resign given the choice, he said that if ordered to attack Protestants he would, but if offered a choice he would resign.
This led to the idea the army could not be trusted to enforce government policy in Ireland, adding seven layers of difficulty to the whole thing.
https://twitter.com/richardosman/status/1159005124238426112?s=19
And he would table a regular VONC not a funky one
I wrote a header on it a generation ago (just before IndyRef 1) arguing that lessons from Ireland suggested radical reform was the only way to stave off demands for independence - piecemeal reform just delays things
(Albeit the current government apparently aims to sabotage ANY agreement with the EU. The backstop becomes a pretext in that case).
I was born 16 years after the end of WW2 but there were echoes of it everywhere at that time including old bomb shelters still extant in the parks.
Not as fun as the naval gunship that was ordered to Belfast, took a wrong turn and ended up sailing up the Thames...
Think about this scenario in more detail: The UK government is in gridlock, after 20 Conservatives voted against Johnson's premiership. The HOC needs desperately to find an emergency PM, and Corbyn has been rejected. Corbyn refuses to back Clarke, while Clarke assures the house that he would be PM for three weeks and then enable a GE.
Now how many Tory MPs would in desperation vote for Clarke to get out of this chaos? Many many more than the initial 20 rebels, maybe 100.
How many Labour MPs would vote for Clarke against Corbyn's wishes? All except for Corbyn, Hohey and a few extreme Corbyn supporters, so 220 Labour MPs. (Most shadow ministers are prepared to work with Corbyn but are not going to stay on the sinking ship to stay loyal to him.)
Add in the SNP, and LDs, PC, and Green and you are way over the 328 needed for the "House to have confidence in Clarke as PM"
McDonnell wants to win, and is much more of a classic politician, willing to do tactical deals as needed. Talk to the SNP about allowing another referendum? Sure. Do a deal with Clarke? I wouldn't be in the least surprised. Persuade Jeremy to go along with it? Er. Maybe.
Supporters? They'd be fine with that. Focusing on winning the ensuing election would totally preoccupy them.
Thus far, most MPs have displayed a marked reluctance to set aside tribal loyalties to anywhere near that extent. They know an election is coming, and I think most will cling to their party as their best hope of re-election.
We were off to Canada in 1967, except the migration visa was turned down because of my mothers health.
What happens when Johnson has already lost the confidence vote, and a large block of Conservative MPs back Clarke? Would these MPs also lose the whip? That would mean a lot of Conservative constituencies would be scrabbling to find new candidates for general election called a few weeks afterwards, and a lot of high profile ex-Conservative MPs standing for election as independents.
If you think otherwise then you need reevaluate your life choices.
The ramifications of his decision to open fire were - interesting.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9r0pISqCDRw
However in Antrim, the largest county in Northern Ireland, every seat is held by the DUP and those seats also voted Leave in the EU referendum. Rather than let Northern Ireland go what would be more sensible would be a redrawing of the boundaries
Any Labour MP who voted for Clarke would be told they will lose the whip. The number of Labour MPs who vote for Clarke then would be zero.
There might be a number of recently ex-Labour MPs who resign the whip in the face of a General Election to vote for Clarke but you can probably count that number on your fingers it won't be 220.
Everything else came later.
I particularly liked: "The Kamchatka eventually rejoined the fleet and claimed that she had engaged three Japanese warships and fired over 300 shells: the ships she had actually fired at were a Swedish merchantman, a German trawler, and a French schooner" and that one of the ships reportedly fired over 500 shells without hitting anything.
Their rapid defeat in the Sea of Japan could hardly have been a surprise.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Mdi_Fh9_Ag&t=76s
I had no memory of it obviously, but everyone around me from the two generations above me, must have had relatively fresh memories of it.
Yes indeed - A glimpse of a ladies ankle in a stiff breeze whilst perambulating in Hyde Park. Those were the days .....
Loyalist paramilitaries, the Orange Order etc would not accept being forced out of the UK
It is not the purview of any Westminster politician to dictate when Scotland has a vote on the constitutional question. While the matter may be reserved in terms of constitution, UK law is SUBORDINATE to international law and to international treaties.
So important is the right to self-determination the the United Nations made it the first paragraph of the first article in the first part of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights ratified by resolution 2200A (XXI) of 16 December 1966under article 49.
In states: "All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development."
Now my children are very young but they when they grow up won't really remember veterans of even WWII.
Yes they will have to accept it and they will not have a choice. If the UK leaves NI then the Orange Order will have no more to say about that than people in Hong Kong did. The UK and Ireland have both already agreed that the future of NI will be decided democratically and nobody has any interest in redrawing boundaries.
If a majority vote to join Ireland then the UK will say thank you, good luck and goodbye. The Orange Order can do as it pleases, we will be out.
Scots have had that once-in-a-lifetime vote of self-determination. There is no requirement, much as I would want it, for Westminster to agree a second. Good luck fighting it in an international court.
Sadly I missed the excitement of the 1960's...... engaged in 1960, married in 1962!
I see the nature of official enquiries has not greatly changed in the last century or so...
The report produced by the International Commission concluded that: "the commissioners declare that their findings, which are therein formulated, are not, in their opinion, of a nature to cast any discredit upon the military qualities or the humanity of Admiral Rojdestvensky, or of the personnel of his squadron". It also concluded as follows: "the commissioners take pleasure in recognising, unanimously, that Admiral Rozhestvensky personally did everything he could, from beginning to end of the incident, to prevent trawlers, recognised as such, from being fired upon by the squadron"
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36616028
There was a BBC documentary on the Hull experience a couple of years ago. Near the start, a map is shown of the impacts of bombs. I was stunned to see how many had landed during the whole war on the part of the city where I grew up. Then the presenter revealed that the map was for just one night of the blitz.
NEW THREAD
Can you tell me, if Westminster refuses to grant a second vote, in which court you would fight that based on international law? And why the Catalans haven't already done that? Whether you like it or not it is a reserved matter so Westminster absolutely has a say, as the SNP tacitly agreed when they made the agreement with Westminster last time.
Not sure why you're calling me a fascist when I want you to be able to have a second vote and I want you to win it. Realpolitik however means you don't need to just convince Holyrood, you need a majority in Westminster too.
Edit: BTW, he was massively pro-European.
Loyalist paramilitaries, the Orange Order etc would not accept being forced out of the UK against their will and Fermanagah and Tyrone and the Real IRA etc would not accept a hard border in Ireland either so a redrawing of the boundaries it has to be.
Northern Ireland has only had peace since the Troubles under the Good Friday Agreement as Protestant Unionists were still part of the UK and Catholic Nationalists had an open border with the Republic of Ireland so felt no division (though I know Boris will try and avoid a hard border if No Deal)