howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
Guest 3065 and ray hutstone like this
ray hutstone- Registered: 1 Apr 2018
- Posts: 2,158
Excellent little film. Very amusing in places. Thanks, Howard.
Ross Miller likes this
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
The bit with the Wetherspoon's founder mouthing off in one of his pubs stood out for me Ray, he is a firm supporter of the plan to keep low wage workers out of the country. Most of his staff in central locations are immigrants on the minimum wage and with staff turnover so high due to poor working conditions his business could grind to a halt.
Ross Miller likes this
Guest 3065- Registered: 10 Jan 2019
- Posts: 145
Great video loved the wetherspoons owner Tim martin talking about brexit
Jan Higgins
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 5 Jul 2010
- Posts: 13,822
howard mcsweeney1 wrote:The bit with the Wetherspoon's founder mouthing off in one of his pubs stood out for me Ray, he is a firm supporter of the plan to keep low wage workers out of the country. Most of his staff in central locations are immigrants on the minimum wage and with staff turnover so high due to poor working conditions his business could grind to a halt.
Not only immigrants but also those who are grateful just to have a job like my grandson when he was at university. Pub work has always been a low income job but also a way of getting perks and tips to top up the pay.
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I try to be neutral and polite but it is hard and getting even more difficult at times.
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howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
Matthew Parris in the Times.
The Queen is wrong. She is wrong on two counts. The opinion she expressed is wrong. And, right or wrong, she should not have expressed an opinion at all. Let’s make no bones about this. She did express an opinion. This is what she said: “As we look for new answers in the modern age, I for one prefer the tried and tested recipes, like speaking well of each other and respecting different points of view; coming together to seek out the common ground; and never losing sight of the bigger picture. To me, these approaches are timeless and I commend them to everyone.” You may think that telling the Sandringham branch of the Women’s Institute that it would be nice if everyone got on better and tried to “seek out the common ground” is an unexceptionable, even trite, thing to say — the sort of thing Her Majesty is expected to say — but in the present circumstances it is very far from that. This is, of course, all about Brexit.
Her prime minister has reached a proposed deal with the European Union. She has repeated until blue in the face that it may not be perfect but it is a reasonable compromise and the best we can get. She has begged convinced Remainers (on one side) and hardline Brexiteers (on the other) to make this their common ground and compromise. She has appealed to the opposition to sink differences in the national interest, and invited their leader to talk to her.
And now the Queen tells the nation (for, make no mistake, the Sandringham WI was simply her platform) that people should come together to seek out “the common ground”. What can that mean but compromise? I struggle to think what more she could have said in a barely disguised appeal to members of parliament and to both sides of the Brexit debate to support Theresa May’s deal. What else do you think (say) Dominic Grieve and Anna Soubry, on one side of this argument, and Jacob Rees-Mogg and Peter Bone, on the other, are supposed to conclude that their sovereign is saying?
Be clear: calling for compromise is taking a position, it is not standing back from the fray. Three positions are available to the disputants in this case. First, stick to your guns and fight for Remain. Second, stick to your guns and fight for a hard (or “clean”) Brexit. Third, compromise on a middle way, a “soft” Brexit. The Queen is now gunning for the third option. This is a political point of view, an angrily contested one. It was inappropriate for the monarch to intervene.
But not only did she intervene, she put the Crown behind a general principle which is simply wrong. The “coming together” behind a compromise is not a “timeless” approach to be “commended to everyone”, a “tried and tested recipe” for “the modern age”. It is an approach which is commendable in some circumstances and not in others.
Brian Dixon
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
she said this, he said that,. its like being back at school again. wish people would shut up until they got all the facts.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
Brian Dixon wrote:she said this, he said that,. its like being back at school again. wish people would shut up until they got all the facts.
That was a better rant than the one yesterday Brian, they do say practice makes perfect.
Brian Dixon likes this
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
Just this once I agree with spreadsheet Phil, extending article 50 could well see extreme views on either side even more entrenched than they are now.
https://news.sky.com/story/philip-hammond-ticking-clock-will-focus-minds-on-brexit-11617009howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
Button likes this
Button
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 22 Jul 2016
- Posts: 3,033
Oh for pity's sake!
"Such checks would increase immigration queues by 90 seconds per person,” Jenkins said. The ETOA chief executive also noted that 30,000 U.K. nationals depart from Dover every day and suggested it could produce “delays of one month on day one,” he said, according to the report."
So I scamper down to the Eastern Docks at 23:01 hrs on March 30th, find myself at the head of any queue at PAF's juxtaposed (ie. drip-feed) Schengen controls and am then facing a delay of 'normal processing time + 90 seconds' = 1 month? I think not! I mean, coo, imagine the rugger scrum at St Pancras waiting to board a Eurostar...
Reginald Barrington and Captain Haddock like this
(Not my real name.)
Button- Location: Dover
- Registered: 22 Jul 2016
- Posts: 3,033
Oops, I meant the 29th!
24 hours later, if the report is somehow right after all, pinching one of those little inflatable boats abandoned on our shores could become an attractive option.
(Not my real name.)
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
Extending hours and cutting out the half term break seems rather pointless if there is nothing new to debate, I don't see the EU bending on anything.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-47018418Captain Haddock
- Location: Marlinspike Hall
- Registered: 8 Oct 2012
- Posts: 7,987
Talk of martial law now and troops on the streets post Brexit - on the plus side this might bring knife crime down a bit?
Pablo and Guest 3065 like this
"We are living in very strange times, and they are likely to get a lot stranger before we bottom out"
Dr. Hunter S Thompson
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
Thankfully we can rely on the great British public to keep the debate to an intellectual level.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
Latest bulletin from our PM in waiting.
Theresa May is planning to fight for a "freedom clause" from Brussels in a move that will win the "full-throated" support of the entire nation if she succeeds, Boris Johnson says. Writing in The Telegraph, the former Foreign Secretary says he has heard "from the lips of very senior sources" that the Prime Minister is planning to go to Brussels and renegotiate the Northern Ireland customs backstop.
Describing the plans as "unadulaterated good Brexit news", he says that an exit mechanism or sunset clause will "defuse the booby trap" and give the UK a "way out" to negotiate a Canada-style trade deal with the EU. He calls on the Prime Minister to now publicly confirm her "change of heart" and reveal "exactly what the Government has asked for", including the detail of the "freedom clauses" she is seeking to secure from Brussels.
The European Union has repeatedly insisted that it will not renegotiate the backstop, while Ireland's Foreign Minister said it "isn't going to change". However Mr Johnson says: "That backstop is dead, rejected by the biggest ever parliamentary majority; and that is why I hope and pray that I am right about the intentions of Number 10. "If we mean it, if we really try, I have no doubt that the EU will give us the Freedom Clause we need. So now is the time to stiffen the sinews and summon up the blood and get on that trusty BAE 146 and go back to Brussels and get it.
"And if the PM secures that change – a proper UK-sized perforation in the fabric of the backstop itself - I have no doubt that she will have the whole country full-throatedly behind her." Since quitting Cabinet over the Prime Minister's Brexit strategy, Mr Johnson has been one of her most prominent critics. His intervention is likely to be seen by Downing Street as a signal that other Eurosceptics are prepared to soften their position and back her deal if she can resolve the backstop issue. Mr Johnson and a number of senior Eurosceptics were invited into Number Ten in recent days to discuss the Prime Minister's plans. He says in his article that "Team Freedom" - which includes Mrs May's husband Philip and Julian Smith, the Chief Whip - have won out over "Team Remain" in Downing Street.
The Government is expected to signal its intentions this week by supporting an amendment tabled by Sir Graham Brady, the chairman of the 1922 committee of backbenchers, which calls for the backstop to be scrapped and replaced with "alternative arrangements". The Prime Minister is understood to believe that if the amendment passes it will give her the "mandate" that she needs to go back to Brussels and change the backstop.
However The Telegraph understands that Eurosceptics are pushing the Prime Minister to make a public statement about her approach in the Commons on Monday in order to secure their backing. In giving his endorsement to the approach, Mr Johnson acknowledges that some will say he is "naive" and "point out that the backstop is not the only defect of the withdrawal agreement". "They will say that we are all being gulled, and that there is a bait-and-switch plan to get MPs to back the deal on the condition that the backstop is removed," he says. "And then somehow, alas, it will turn out that this condition was impossible to satisfy and all we will get, after weeks of talks, is another footling letter of “clarification” from Brussels. "That is why we need to understand, now, what is behind these rumours of the PM’s change of heart. We need to know whether the Treaty really will be revised.
"We need to see the Freedom Clauses written down. We need to know exactly what the government is asking for – and we need to hear it directly from the Prime Minister herself."
Jan Higgins- Location: Dover
- Registered: 5 Jul 2010
- Posts: 13,822
Since the EU said they will not change their side of the agreement, nothing can change whatever our lot from the PM, cabinet, MP's left, middle or extreme right waffle on about.
So all the pundits and those who think they can change various bits of the agreement prior to any vote are wasting their and our time, just get on with it so everyone knows what to plan for the future.
Button likes this
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I try to be neutral and polite but it is hard and getting even more difficult at times.
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Brian Dixon- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
the quickest way to get the EU listen is, to revoke articall 50 and stick 2 fingers up at them.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
I think the BRC are wasting their time trying to get through to those in the Westminster bubble who are much more interested in playing politics.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-47028748
