Is Brexit actually going to happen?

[teuchter]

But you don’t actually experience it, do you? You don’t get caught in the system of everybody blaming everybody else with no apparent accountability at all. You don’t get told you can’t use a train because your ticket isn’t applicable for that rail operating company. You don’t get the daily frustration of the consequences of privatisation.

Yes, I do. I don't commute every day by rail, but I do travel on rush hour services, I am sometimes left standing on the platform at my local station because there's physically no room to get on the train, and I do run up against ticketing issues and am frequntly frustrated by them.

Where we disagree is what the solution is. I've said it before many times; I opposed privatisation when it happened and I don't think the current system works. I don't think nationalisation is the answer though. I want more investment of public money, strategic oversight, and I want changes to the way the franchising system is regulated. I want the same to happen with local buses and I want the two systems to be properly integrated. These are not things that the UK government shows any sign of doing. These are things that are more or less evident in other European countries and there's not a correlation with state/private ownership.

 

[stethoscope]

Public money finding its way into something that's not publicly owned is pretty much the shit neoliberal position we're in now to a degree, isn't it?!

 

[DotCommunist]

e we Brits are irreedeeambly bad anyway we deserve what we are getting and more

the projected self loathing of the middle classes has been pronounced in the wake of brexit. David Michellesque self-hatred only its not a joke. More fool me for taking the light self deprecation at face value and not noticing the well of despair behind it. Punish us barnier

 

[J Ed]

It's a bit or a straw man though, isn't it. We don't have nationalised rail in this country and a Tory Brexit will not make this more likely, in fact the trade deals we will be offered outside the EU will make it even less likely.

A Tory anything won't make it more or less likely, a point which is entirely separate from the discussion we are having.

 

[teuchter]

Public money finding its way into something that's not publicly owned is pretty much the shit neoliberal position we're in now to a degree, isn't it?!

I don't have a dogmatic approach to exactly what kind of entities public money goes to. Perhaps you do. Fair enough. I don't happen to think it's an approach that will sort out transport issues. I'm more interested in what the public money buys and whether it's useful.

 

[Santino]

I don't have a dogmatic approach to exactly what kind of entities public money goes to. Perhaps you do. Fair enough. I don't happen to think it's an approach that will sort out transport issues. I'm more interested in what the public money buys and whether it's useful.

What's your approach to public money going to entities that, by their very nature, seek to maximise the proportion of that money that is kept for shareholders and minimise the tax they pay?

 

[binka]

What's your approach to public money going to entities that, by their very nature, seek to maximise the proportion of that money that is kept for shareholders and minimise the tax they pay?

Not sure if you're aware of this or not but private companies being inherently more efficient than publicly owned entities it means shareholders can take their cut while still delivering better quality services. Everybody wins

 

[J Ed]

I don't have a dogmatic approach to exactly what kind of entities public money goes to. Perhaps you do. Fair enough. I don't happen to think it's an approach that will sort out transport issues. I'm more interested in what the public money buys and whether it's useful.

Behold, the re-birth of Giddens

 

[teuchter]

What's your approach to public money going to entities that, by their very nature, seek to maximise the proportion of that money that is kept for shareholders and minimise the tax they pay?

In the instance of rail - well written and specified franchise contracts. What's yours? Nationalise every entity in the supply chain?

 

[teuchter]

Not sure if you're aware of this or not but private companies being inherently more efficient than publicly owned entities it means shareholders can take their cut while still delivering better quality services. Everybody wins

Just to kill this off, I don't believe this. I don't think there's any clear evidence for whether private or public works best for rail services. That's why I'm not too bothered either way. Give me persuasive evidence - I'll change my mind.

 

[J Ed]

Who writes the contracts? Who enforces them?

 

[J Ed]

What does better mean? Better for who? The status quo is better now, for some.

 

[sleaterkinney]

A Tory anything won't make it more or less likely, a point which is entirely separate from the discussion we are having.

No, because a Tory Brexit is what we're having.

 

[stethoscope]

No, because a Tory Brexit is what we're having.

And the EU is committed to the liberalising (privatising) of markets, including rail, so what's your point?

 

[The39thStep]

Not sure if you're aware of this or not but private companies being inherently more efficient than publicly owned entities it means shareholders can take their cut while still delivering better quality services. Everybody wins

Aside from arriving on time what else would make a quality railway service ?

What is it with private companies that make them inherently more efficient btw?

 

[sleaterkinney]

And the EU is committed to the liberalising (privatising) of markets, including rail, so what's your point?

As I said we have privatisation already and a Tory Brexit won't change this, in fact they plan more liberalising off the back of it.

 

[stethoscope]

As I said we have privatisation already and a Tory Brexit won't change this, in fact they plan more liberalising off the back of it.

Tories will do what Tories will do in regards to liberalising markets. And yet, so do the EU.

 

[binka]

Aside from arriving on time what else would make a quality railway service ?

What is it with private companies that make them inherently more efficient btw?

I was doing that thing where people say the opposite of what they mean

 

[Santino]

As I said we have privatisation already and a Tory Brexit won't change this, in fact they plan more liberalising off the back of it.

It was better when the EU stopped them privatising everything.

 

[teuchter]

Who writes the contracts? Who enforces them?

An arm of government. Effectively the same people as those who would make strategic decisions if the railways were nationalised.

 

[sleaterkinney]

Tories will do what Tories will do in regards to liberalising markets. And yet, so do the EU.

Exactly, the tory brexit won't smash neo-liberalism, it will continue as before.

 

[stethoscope]

Exactly, the tory brexit won't smash neo-liberalism, it will continue as before.

It certainly will in the EU, and yet the liberal breakdowns about what Tories will do post-leave with Labour being destroyed for a generation hasn't materialised. The Tories are all over the shop and split as ever and Labour actually made ground since (not that I care much for Labour being some sort of salvation though). As has been argued before, capital wanted remain and so (even marginal) opportunities to disrupt capital and the status quo still exist.

 

[DotCommunist]

Obo has a piece today in opinion section once more saying that Labour must now back Remain, noting that its working class vote in the last election was majority remain so thats it. Labour did not in fact win though, good show tho. So it might need to be appealing to more than simply who they've already got. Now this article is from Best for Britain who I read about the other day, its gina millers thing. I'd heard of them the other day from this amusing aside

Seymour:

It would be an insult to astroturf to call this astroturf. There may come a time when the "movement" rhetoric comes with some simulation of an actual movement. But thus far it is a campaign with about half a dozen people involved. And it claims to be "powered by Best for Britain, Open Britain, The European Movement, and the GCG". Best for Britain, everyone knows as the Gina Miller-led campaign. Open Britain is the successor to the dynamic and very successful and in no way shambolic business-led Britain Stronger in Europe campaign. The European Movement is essentially a bunch of pro-EU Tory MPs like Ken Clarke and Douglas Hurd. And "the GCG"? That's Chuka Umunna and Anna Soubry. (I still remember those halcyon, early Brexit days when Chuka was an immigrant-bashing Blue Labourite).


So, as I say, it's not even astroturf. The only grassroots in this campaign are those burrowing into the remains of Jean Monnet. Now, here's the thing. The Brexit press has been running a series of conspiracy-tinged articles complaining about George Soros funding the Remainer plot. If these people weren't bonkers, they would be laughing themselves sick. These Remain campaigns, from BSE to 'Another Europe is Possible' (because chillstep and solidarity), have all been unutterably fucking naff. And this is by far the worst. "Old folks will die soon, so why should we have Brexit?" Really? Of all the reasons to be opposed to, or sceptical about, Brexit, this is the most sociopathic and inane. If you're a serious-minded Remainer, or even just someone who prefers politics to be political, this should be offensive.

Now, if I were a paid journalist, I would make some belligerent phone-calls and start demanding answers, answers dammit. To questions such as, do you have any idea how ridiculous you people look? How unbearably awful, and phoney? How vapid, cheap, sleazy and opportunistic? Are you here to make our right-Brexit lunatic press look substantial by comparison? But Patreons don't pay me enough to work up a lather of outrage over this fucking drivel. Send me some more money, and then we'll see.

In the meantime, here it is. The sheer unutterable vapid horror and disgrace and sociopathic inanity of an official Remain campaign. It may as well call itself "The Values of the Carphone Warehouse".

lol

 

[J Ed]

Obo has a piece today in opinion section once more saying that Labour must now back brexit, noting that its working class vote in the last election was majority remain so thats it. Labour did not in fact win though, good show tho. So it might need to be appealing to more than simply who they've already got. Now this article is from Best for Britain who I read about the other day, its gina millers thing. I'd heard of them the other day from this amusing aside

Seymour:


lol

It's interesting isn't it that we don't, unlike with working-class leavers, get these pathologisations and anthropological studies of dead-end remainers.

 

[stethoscope]

So, basically the author of that piece - politics degree > job at European Parliament > consultancy job doing work for/with EU institutions > CEO of BfB.

 

[butchersapron]

So, basically the author of that piece - politics degree > job at European Parliament > consultancy job doing work for/with EU institutions > CEO of BfB.

Do have a look at where she got her masters from as well.

According to The Times, the "College of Europe, in the medieval Belgian city of Bruges, is to the European political elite what the Harvard Business School is to American corporate life. It is a hothouse where the ambitious and talented go to make contacts".[4]The Economist describes it as "an elite finishing school for aspiring Eurocrats."[5] The Financial Times writes that "the elite College of Europe in Bruges" is "an institution geared to producing crop after crop of graduates with a lifelong enthusiasm for EU integration."[6] European Commissioner for Education Ján Figeľ described the college as "one of the most emblematic centres of European studies in the European Union".[7] The BBC has referred to it as "the EU's very own Oxbridge".[8] The college has also been described as "the leading place to study European affairs"[9] and as "the elite training center for the European Union's political class".[10] RFE/RL has referred to the college as "a Euro-federalist hot-spot."[11] The Global Mail has described its students as "Europe's leaders-in-waiting."[12]

 

[stethoscope]

Christ!

 

[teqniq]

I had a smile..

David Davis: Brexit will not plunge Britain into Mad Max dystopia

At the headline that is.

David Davis will be the guy who loses the tips of his fingers to the feral boy's sharpened boomerang in Mad Max 2 should such a dystopian future occur.

One can only but hope.

 

[Raheem]

I had a smile..

David Davis: Brexit will not plunge Britain into Mad Max dystopia

At the headline that is.

David Davis will be the guy who loses the tips of his fingers to the feral boy's sharpened boomerang in Mad Max 2 should such a dystopian future occur.

One can only but hope.

Given how so far everything Davis has said definitely wouldn't happen has happened, this is worrying. They really need to get him to deny that Brexit will unlock the secrets of everlasting life. He's our most reliable tool, if only we knew how to use him.

 

[DotCommunist]

another day another group

Embarrassed by his mistake, but not by changing his mind – “there is always more passion in a convert” – he is one of four young people to found a youth campaign, Our Future Our Choice (Ofoc), which aims to put young people at the forefront of stopping Brexit. Next month, he will take a year out from studying PPE at Oxford to devote himself full time to the campaign.

Stopping Brexit: ‘The kids don’t want what’s being forced on them’