BREXIT Crunch time (part 38) WTF is going to happen next?

[cupid_stunt]

Clearly it's a compromise, the UK wouldn't be able to just walk away from the Back-Stop, but there would be an "arbitration mechanism", if the UK felt the EU wasn't playing fair, which is a possible method of escape, although it leaves a lot of ifs and buts, and the six million dollar question is if that's enough or not?

Looks like it's going to depend on what the Attorney General, and the eight lawyers in the ERG, have to say on these new documents, if they declare they are enough to lift the threat of the UK being trapped permanently in the Back-Stop, that will probably be enough to win over the DUP and the ERG, then trigger the rest of the Tory backbenchers and a few Labour leave MPs to support it, and thus it will pass.

If they advise it's not enough, May is completely fucked.

 

[redsquirrel]

I think the DUP rather than the ERG are the key here. If the DUP say yes then it gives lots of Tory eurosceptics an out to vote for the deal.


The statements the DUP are making today are rather different from those in Dec/Jan

The leader of the Democratic Unionist party, Arlene Foster, whose MPs the prime minister relies on to get legislation through parliament, said: “These publications need careful analysis. We will be taking appropriate advice, scrutinising the text line by line and forming our own judgement.”

Nigel Dodds, the Westminster leader of the Democratic Unionist Party said: “All of this will need to be taken together and analysed very carefully.”

 

[grit]

Somewhere, someone will be milking a lot of cash out of all this uncertainty. I doubt it’s any of us.

It’s already made, consumer facing businesses were shorted earlier in the process.

 

[Don Troooomp]

I'm going "General election". Regardless of anyone's opinion about the rights and wrongs of Brexit, May is making a massive mess of everything, totally knackering any chance the UK has of a reasonable deal if it leaves the EU, and totally shagging any possible relationship with the EU should remain actually happen.
She should resign as soon as possible, go to the queen to request parliament be dissolved, then call a general election.

 

[maomao]

She should resign as soon as possible, go to the queen to request parliament be dissolved, then call a general election.

That's not how general elections get called anymore.

 

[ska invita]

Whatever happens today one of my predictions will have been right

 

[8ball]

That's not how general elections get called anymore.

Also, the chances of May finding some integrity behind the sofa don’t seem too great.

 

[Kaka Tim]

I think the DUP rather than the ERG are the key here. If the DUP say yes then it gives lots of Tory eurosceptics an out to vote for the deal.


The statements the DUP are making today are rather different from those in Dec/Jan

dunno - there are just saying "we will need to read it carefully" - but if - as most of the analysis is saying - its the same deal with some meaningless tweaks. They will come back and say "we have read it and have decided its still a pile of shit"

 

[ska invita]

Looks like it's going to depend on what the Attorney General, and the eight lawyers in the ERG, have to say on these new documents, if they declare they are enough to lift the threat of the UK being trapped permanently in the Back-Stop, that will probably be enough to win over the DUP and the ERG, then trigger the rest of the Tory backbenchers and a few Labour leave MPs to support it, and thus it will pass.

If they advise it's not enough, May is completely fucked.

Which is why releasing the documents at midnight before the vote looks like theres little substance in them. If they were substantial they'd have allowed time for them to be scrutinised and reflected on

 

[Kaka Tim]

i suspect that the "last minute agreement" with the EU was planned weeks ago - gifting may with with a batch of sycophantic headlines and giving mps little time to look at the details and so bounce them into voting it through.
Suspect it will be exposed fairly quickly as the desperate and shabby act of hucksterism it so clearly is.

 

[agricola]

 

[Gerry1time]

i suspect that the "last minute agreement" with the EU was planned weeks ago - gifting may with with a batch of sycophantic headlines and giving mps little time to look at the details and so bounce them into voting it through.
Suspect it will be exposed fairly quickly as the desperate and shabby act of hucksterism it so clearly is.

Yep, that’d be my take on it too. The constant ‘will she go / won’t she go back to strasbourg’ rumours and briefings of the last 36 hours have all been so stage managed. It’s all part of the only plan she’s had for ages now, run the clock down and bounce people into a crap deal. Even the hand kissing photo from last night looked staged. It’s all totally in the EU’s advantage, to get through the deal they want us to sign.

Whether MPs will see through it may not be the point though. Rather, does it give them enough plausible deniability to vote it through then act all surprised later that it was still shit? Will this act of stage management give them the tools to do their own stage management in their constituencies.

Hopefully not, and if *this attempt* fails, surely it’s the end of the road. Surely...

 

[redsquirrel]

dunno - there are just saying "we will need to read it carefully" - but if - as most of the analysis is saying - its the same deal with some meaningless tweaks. They will come back and say "we have read it and have decided its still a pile of shit"

Will they, when that increases the chances of either a GE or a 2nd referendum, when it could lead to no deal or a postponement of the UK leaving. I don't think that is necessarily true.

They ultimately might reject it but the fact that the this is the "same deal with some meaningless tweaks" that they rejected in Jan doesn't mean that they might not accept it now.

 

[ska invita]

Will they, when that increases the chances of either a GE or a 2nd referendum, when it could lead to no deal or a postponement of the UK leaving. I don't think that is necessarily true.

They ultimately might reject it but the fact that the this is the "same deal with some meaningless tweaks" that they rejected in Jan doesn't mean that they might not accept it now.

Definitely - and thats what i expected months ago - that the deal would squeeze at the end once implications became avoidable
But the scale of defeat last time...thats a lot to turn around

 

[Kaka Tim]

Will they, when that increases the chances of either a GE or a 2nd referendum, when it could lead to no deal or a postponement of the UK leaving. I don't think that is necessarily true.

They ultimately might reject it but the fact that the this is the "same deal with some meaningless tweaks" that they rejected in Jan doesn't mean that they might not accept it now.

yeah - that will be a factor - but if everyone and his uncle is saying "nothing's changed" (esp on the backstop) they politically wont be able to - even if they wanted to. not sure how worried the DUP are about a GE - their base aren't going anywhere else and you don't get much in the way of swing voters in norn iron.
And i dont think the DUP will actually give much of a toss if brexit gets postponed or cancelled - the status quo is fine for them - and brexit is actually pretty unpopular even with their own supporters.

 

[Poi E]

yeah - that will be a factor - but if everyone and his uncle is saying "nothing's changed" (esp on the backstop) they politically wont be able to - even if they wanted to. not sure how worried the DUP are about a GE - their base aren't going anywhere else and you don't get much in the way of swing voters in norn iron.
And i dont think the DUP will actually give much of a toss if brexit gets postponed or cancelled - the status quo is fine for them - and brexit is actually pretty unpopular even with their own supporters.

True, but
BREXIT SHOCK: Two thirds of Northern Ireland voters REJECT DUP's stance on EU exit

Apol for the express link...

 

[littlebabyjesus]

yeah - that will be a factor - but if everyone and his uncle is saying "nothing's changed" (esp on the backstop) they politically wont be able to - even if they wanted to. not sure how worried the DUP are about a GE - their base aren't going anywhere else and you don't get much in the way of swing voters in norn iron.
And i dont think the DUP will actually give much of a toss if brexit gets postponed or cancelled - the status quo is fine for them - and brexit is actually pretty unpopular even with their own supporters.

It never really made sense for them to support brexit in the first place. Good distraction from the heating scandal though and the fact that foster is a corrupt idiot.

 

[redsquirrel]

Definitely - and thats what i expected months ago - that the deal would squeeze at the end once implications became avoidable
But the scale of defeat last time...thats a lot to turn around

Yes I agree on both points. I'd be somewhat surprised if it got through this time. My take is that the government are hoping that they get enough movement that it becomes a credible deal and they can bring it back for a third time after making a few more internal concessions.

yeah - that will be a factor - but if everyone and his uncle is saying "nothing's changed" (esp on the backstop) they politically wont be able to - even if they wanted to. not sure how worried the DUP are about a GE - their base aren't going anywhere else and you don't get much in the way of swing voters in norn iron.

That's not the case. Look at the polling flypanam posted earlier in the thread, there is growing dissatisfaction with their position. Now it's possible that those voters will go back to the DUP at a GE but is that a chance they want to risk? Look at the last set of Assembly elections.

I think it's also worth remembering that Foster isn't Paisley, the DUP of 2017 isn't the DUP of 1997. They've been in the government of NI for a considerable time now, they're no longer an opposition unionist party, they are no longer the outsiders. Are the current leadership willing to risk their position and power in a way the older guard would have.

 

[8ball]

If I was betting on it, I’d still guess on an extension for A50, but going by the glacial rate of real progress we’d need a minimum of 80 years.

 

[redsquirrel]

I'm pretty much with Andrew Sparrow's take

1 - How many MPs will Theresa May win over with the concessions she won last night? Some 118 Tories voted against her deal in the first meaningful vote in January. Many of them, worried by the prospect of Brexit being “stolen” by the second referendum campaign, seem to be keen to find reasons why they can be persuaded to vote for her deal now. There don’t seem to be any Westminster observers who expect May to win the vote tonight (assuming it is not delayed for 24 hours, as Iain Duncan Smith said it should be, to give everyone more time to read the new documents), but she could lose by a lot less than the record 230-vote government defeat we saw in January.

2 - Will May do well enough to persuade MPs, and the EU, that she has a chance of getting her deal over the line in a third meaningful vote? It is impossible to know for sure what the benchmark will be, not least a figure that might look potentially disappointing now (a defeat by 100-odd votes) could, by 7pm, look rather different, because context and expectations will have changed. But if May only loses by 50 (implying she would only need to change the minds of 25 MPs in a third vote), that will probably feel like a very good result. And it is hard to see how she will spin a defeat by 150 or more as anything other than another disaster.

 

[chilango]

If nothing else, for us bored and powerless spectators squeezing miniscule drips of joy out of their discomfort May's deal getting through would be an awfully deflating anticlimax.

 

[ska invita]

Im not one to say What IS She Wearing but wtf? is she trying to play up to the image of a Brexiteer

 

[redsquirrel]

Im not one to say What IS She Wearing but wtf? is she trying to play up to the image of a Brexiteer

Too Frenchified. Should have worn a bowler.

 

[ska invita]

If nothing else, for us bored and powerless spectators squeezing miniscule drips of joy out of their discomfort May's deal getting through would be an awfully deflating anticlimax.

anticlimax from what? what does brexit orgasm look like?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

anticlimax from what? what does brexit orgasm look like?

Imagine deliberately thinking of Thatcher as you come to punish yourself. It's worse than that.

 

[Mr Moose]

True, but
BREXIT SHOCK: Two thirds of Northern Ireland voters REJECT DUP's stance on EU exit

Apol for the express link...

That one third still support them suggest their base is probably still onside.

You could probably take a poll on any issue in NI and two thirds would tell you the DUP are wrong.

 

[ska invita]

anticlimax from what? what does brexit orgasm look like?

no need to answer chilango , i think i get what you mean now (its early)

 

[Kaka Tim]

That's not the case. Look at the polling flypanam posted earlier in the thread, there is growing dissatisfaction with their position. Now it's possible that those voters will go back to the DUP at a GE but is that a chance they want to risk? Look at the last set of Assembly elections.

I think it's also worth remembering that Foster isn't Paisley, the DUP of 2017 isn't the DUP of 1997. They've been in the government of NI for a considerable time now, they're no longer an opposition unionist party, they are no longer the outsiders. Are the current leadership willing to risk their position and power in a way the older guard would have.

Im sure they are worried - but im not sure where the electoral threat will come - a revived UUP? or a more hardline breakaway? I guess what will be interesting will be how they act if no deal is imminent - cos nobody in NI bar the loyalist headbangers thinks that is a good idea - which leaves the DUP in a bit of a bind.

 

[cupid_stunt]

Theresa May faces Commons showdown after securing 'legally binding' changes in last-ditch Brexit talks - follow live

 

[chilango]

anticlimax from what? what does brexit orgasm look like?

Well, given as any resolution is going to be one that fucks us all over some more, I'm taking meagre solace in watching them fuck themselves over (however fleetingly) in the process.