Thought I'd start a new thread as this is going to be a major talking point this year...have not made up my mind yet...(unlike bucksfizz)....but thinking of voting for an exit as Europe is not doing Britain any good at all it seems....

I expected nothing and Mays deal is probably worse than nothing although I'd agree it just to move on if she can change the back stop so your right cynic.

Stan , video was good :-)

Dil,

I've got no idea where Mansfield even is, but their electorate fit the target demographic and are clearly impressionable.

You're always going to support Cardiff and vote leave. 25% of the UK population think similarly, and there's no point spending time or money in getting you to change your mind.

In exactly the same way, Stan's always going to support Burnley and vote to remain. He's indicative of another 25% of the population who will never change their views.

Then there's the other 50%. 25% won't vote and 25% show the potential to be turned. Mansfield was the 7th heaviest Brexit voting area in the UK. The top 10 Brexit areas were all in that same East Midlands, East of England region. They all fit the target demographic for turning.

'Thousands of Tory party members' to defect to Nigel Farage's Brexit Party as it gets official approval




By Christopher Hope, Chief Political Correspondent
8 February 2019 • 4:00pm


Thousands of Conservative members are likely to defect to a new Brexit party which was officially recognised on Friday by the electoral regulator, its backers claim.

The Electoral Commission on Friday formally recognised the Brexit Party as an official organisation which will allow it to field candidates at elections.

Nigel Farage, the former Ukip leader who is supporting the party, said "the engine is running" and he stood "ready for battle" to fight the Tories and Labour if European Parliament elections are held on May 23.



More: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2019/02/08/thousands-tory-party-members-defect-nigel-farages-brexit-party/

Hils , I agree but there doesn't seem to be any appetite for another vote either in Parliament or the country as a whole and if there were one with the same question asked I reckon Leave would win again but on a smaller turn out thus solving nothing.

Farage might actually pull the Conservatives together to get the deal passed with this latest stunt.

Good luck to him but Labour voters will back him too just as they did in Wales at the last assembly election.

Dil, It, Manuel, Marty, and George

You rejoicing in the possible destruction of the UK's relationship with the EU reminds me of this:


“would not be the least bit surprised if suddenly, out of the blue, amid the universal future reasonableness, some gentleman of ignoble or, better, of retrograde and jeering physiognomy, should emerge, set his arms akimbo, and say to us all: ‘Well, gentlemen, why don’t we reduce all this reasonableness to dust with one good kick, for the sole purpose of sending all these logarithms to the devil and living once more according to our own stupid will!’ That would still be nothing, but what is offensive is that he’d be sure to find followers: that’s how man is arranged.”

Similarities to the wish of the destruction of Paris on the German retreat from France in the 1940s.

when the (protestant) huguenots were hounded out of france at the end of 17th century, they brought silk spinning and weaving skills to spitalfields (london)

i haven't studied quite how and why, but many of them subsequently migrated to mansfield in nottinghamshire, and that town became and i think still remains the uk centre for silk production

somehow or other, i discovered (was told) that the very first rugby international was between the mill workers of mansfield of those of paris

You mistake the breaking of ties with the EU project, conceived without any sovereign consent, with that of Europe. I have good friends in Europe, none in the tower of Babel. Nor do I wish.

good to see fred harking back to a novelist of the mid 19th century (dostoyesky)

#LedByDonkeys

I was wrong in initially thinking this was Soros' money. Apparently it's crowdfunded - raised £125k of a £150k target with 5 days to go. Each billboard costs about £1k a month.

Fred keeps demonstrating the relevance of Godwin’s Law and falling in to the trap of association fallacy.

Dil,

I'm not a big fan of a second referendum myself, although it may prove to be the only way out of the deadlock assuming that Brexit gets delayed.

I've heard the argument about older Brexiters dying and younger remainers now being old enough to vote, but everybody is now two or three years older and fallen into the next age band up where the leavers have a higher share of the vote.

Then there's the matter of the question asked. I very much doubt it would be the same question as before (the public wouldn't appreciate being asked the same question twice, and just tick the same box as before), but what question would be asked that would get the right result? And if it were a three question referendum, research has shown that the second preference counting method could produce different outcomes.

The biggest issue as I see it though, is who would head up the remain camp in a second referendum? You'd normally expect it to be the PM backed by the government, but having spent 2 years negotiating an exit, she can't do it now. Corbyn probably wouldn't want to do it, and who knows how he'd side??!!??

So what other high profile figures are there who could lead it? Blair? Cameron? They've got too much baggage. You'd be left with the likes of Yvette Cooper and Vince Cable to head up the remain camp - nice people, but not the figureheads that would be needed imo.

Martini,

For me, the behaviour is still analogous whether you can or are unable to recognise it to be so.

Hils , really can't see it happening as it could cause more problems than it solves not least of all giving credibility to the SNPs call for a second independence vote.

Fred , we are not destroying our relationship with the EU we are renegotiating the terms of the relationship.

Perhaps, you are right.

8-)

Talking about a hard border : how about the chimps that escaped from Belfast zoo ? using storm debris....aren't they clever monkeys ?....(that was part one....)……(part two : the irish ones went back in as they would miss tea-time)…….

Very good RF, except that it should have been posted on the joke thread as well...just where all the other Brexit jokes and Brexit joke posters should be )-:

Cheers Stan....perhaps I should have put : Brexitea-time.....(;))…..

One of the ideas in this weekend's press was that, assuming no movement had been made on the current deal, a motion might be moved whereby Parliament would approve May's current deal on the condition that it was subject to a binary referendum with the question 'Should Parliament accept May's deal or stay in the EU?'. To hold the referendum a short extension of Article 50 would be required. Apparently there's cross-party support for it in Parliament as it appeases leavers and remainers and breaks the impasse.

Nobody knows whether a motion like that would have any mileage, but if it did and there was a new referendum, I'm curious how the likes of BoJo would vote given their public denouncement of the current deal, and how it was supposedly worse than staying in the EU. I'd also be interested to know of anybody here who previously voted to leave who would either not vote or now vote to remain given the choice above.

Are you asking the lemmings, like Dil, It, Marti and Georgi, if they are changing direction?

Hardly lemmings Fred. At the time, the odds were on stick-in-the-muds wanting to stay in their comfort zone. The people who voted leave made up their own minds in the face of the full propaganda machine from the government. We will not change direction. We had the vote, we voted, you didn't, end of.