Hard Brexit or Hard Brexit

[Scot Dutchy]

Look forward to the May dictatorship. Power has been handed on a platter to May's cronies. The Brexit plan all along. They could not care about negotiations as it was a sham. England will become a play ground for the 1%. The police are already getting a above the CAP pay rise. Welcome to the 51st state of America?

[Brian Peacock]

Sometimes a nation needs to express itself with more than just an attitude. The Bill that passed last night goes to the very heart of what it means to be a citizen living in a representative democracy, and its continuing passage and its implementation into law need to be examined and discussed in that context. The enclosing of all current EU law into the UK statute is a good and necessary thing, and some method for examining those laws within the context of the statute book as a whole needs to be worked into the Bill. However, granting the executive branch of government the power to revise the statue book by ministerial fiat is not how a representative democracy works, and while the Bill's passage is subject to the normal means of Parliamentary scrutiny and review, once enacted the government of the day would, for example, have a legal and constitutional power to revise the scope, aims and implementation of the Bill itself - as it saw fit, and without reference to Parliament.

No single government can ever hope to achieve a wholesale revision of the statute book simple by granting ministers the power to decided what is a good law and what is a bad law. A wholesale revision of the UK statute book is, by necessity, a long-term project and a more formal and structured solution that involves the positive assent of Parliament needs to be applied.

[mistermack]

The bill does what's necessary to make the transition.
The ministerial powers are necessary to make quick fixes, if problems arise, without the huge delay of going through parliament.
But parliament still has the power to amend it all at any stage.
All in all, it's just a common sense practical measure, to cover the short term problems that might arise.
It's not a permanent transfer of power to ministers. And if it was, THAT could be reversed too.
In the end, parliament holds the power.

Correction :
Or it will, once we are out.

[Scot Dutchy]

But that is exactly what is going to happen; a dictatorship. Although the UK is not a democracy it does have a break on law making built into the system. Even the unelected HoL applies it now and again. This bill is going to remove that brake so it will be full speed ahead into autocracy.

[mistermack]

But that is exactly what is going to happen; a dictatorship. Although the UK is not a democracy it does have a break on law making built into the system. Even the unelected HoL applies it now and again. This bill is going to remove that brake so it will be full speed ahead into autocracy.

As opposed to the unelected European court making the laws at present?
Is that called a judgeocracy?

[Scot Dutchy]

But that is exactly what is going to happen; a dictatorship. Although the UK is not a democracy it does have a break on law making built into the system. Even the unelected HoL applies it now and again. This bill is going to remove that brake so it will be full speed ahead into autocracy.

As opposed to the unelected European court making the laws at present?
Is that called a judgeocracy?

Which court makes laws? Which courts are elected? Please do try and think.

[mistermack]

Which court makes laws? Which courts are elected? Please do try and think.

I'm surprised you don't know.

[pErvinalia]

The bill does what's necessary to make the transition.
The ministerial powers are necessary to make quick fixes, if problems arise, without the huge delay of going through parliament.
But parliament still has the power to amend it all at any stage.
All in all, it's just a common sense practical measure, to cover the short term problems that might arise.
It's not a permanent transfer of power to ministers. And if it was, THAT could be reversed too.
In the end, parliament holds the power.

Why didn't they put in a sunset clause?

[pErvinalia]

But that is exactly what is going to happen; a dictatorship. Although the UK is not a democracy it does have a break on law making built into the system. Even the unelected HoL applies it now and again. This bill is going to remove that brake so it will be full speed ahead into autocracy.

As opposed to the unelected European court making the laws at present?
Is that called a judgeocracy?

The judiciary is one of the modern four estates, and is vital to a functioning democracy.

[Brian Peacock]

The bill does what's necessary to make the transition.
The ministerial powers are necessary to make quick fixes, if problems arise, without the huge delay of going through parliament.
But parliament still has the power to amend it all at any stage.
All in all, it's just a common sense practical measure, to cover the short term problems that might arise.
It's not a permanent transfer of power to ministers. And if it was, THAT could be reversed too.
In the end, parliament holds the power.

Correction :
Or it will, once we are out.

Would you be happy for a Corbyn government to have the power to "amend, repeal and improve" any law on the UK statute book by ministerial fiat?

As I pointed out, even the proposed limits and time-frames of the current Bill as it stands could be subject to amendment, repeal and 'improvement' by ministerial fiat, and although this power cannot be applied to laws yet to be passed after the end of the current parliamentary period ministers will be able to apply changes with respect to any other standing law and by which, as the wording of the Bill puts it, Ministers "may make any provision that could be made by an Act of Parliament" that "the Minister considers appropriate to prevent, remedy or mitigate any failure" of either the retained EU law/regulation or any conflict between retained EU law/regulation and the common statute,

That the UK statute book will need a wholesale revision when all EU law and regulation passes onto the UK statute book on exit day is not in dispute. The point is, is it appropriate for a minister to be able to make 'any provision that could be made by an Act of Parliament', without reference to Parliament (without a means of parliamentary scrutiny or any requirement for positive assent from the Commons) as long as they consider it appropriate to do so?

The full text of the Bill, along with it's explanatory notes can be found here: http://services.parliament.uk/bills/201 ... rawal.html

[mistermack]

It is appropriate, and necessary.

1) Because of speed. Unforseen problems need to be handled much faster than parliament can manage.
2) Because any changes a minister makes be reversed at a later date if parliament wants it.

What's the worst that can happen? A minister makes a change that nobody likes. He pays the personal price, and parliament changes it.

What's the worst that can happen without that ability? Chaos when an unforseen circumstance causes a ludicrous anomaly, that nobody had the power to put right quickly.

This is never going to be a permanent arrangement. It's a storm in a teacup, designed to try to defeat what the country voted for. By underhand means.

[Brian Peacock]

Fair enough.

Hammond Says U.K. Is Seeking ‘Status Quo’ Brexit Transition

Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond signaled that his government is preparing to announce it wants a “status quo” Brexit transition in which the U.K. temporarily keeps its access to the European Union’s single market after it departs.

“There is general agreement that it would not make sense to ask business to face two sets of changes,” Hammond told the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee in London. “That implies that a transition or interim period would need to look a lot like the status quo, otherwise businesses will be making one set of changes at the beginning of the interim period and another set towards the end of it.”

He said his “ideal solution” for the transition was “that the trade in goods and services would be able to continue as it does now.” The U.K. would be allowed to conduct negotiations on trade deals, but not implement them until the end of the transition.

To be sure, much of the decision-making is in the hands of the EU not the U.K. as the next round of Brexit negotiations have been postponed ahead of Prime Minister Theresa May’s eagerly-anticipated speech on where she now stands on the divorce and transitional arrangements....

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... transition

Sounds awfully like Labour's proposal.

[mistermack]

He's blown his chances of being leader then. He will be sadly missed.

[Brian Peacock]

Nick Cohen in The Observer takes time off kicking Corbyn and Momentum in the arse, and turns his attention to The Religion of Brexit...

The religious insistence that supporting Brexit is a matter of faith, not reason, has the propaganda benefit of keeping supporters in line. Despite the collapse in the pound and living standards, despite the descent of the negotiations into the mire, not one prominent supporter of Brexit has admitted to the smallest doubt. The normal arguments of politics no more exist on the right than they do in the Church of Scientology. Who will break ranks when they know a movement run by vicious hacks will denounce them as traitors? Newspaper proprietors have power without responsibility, Stanley Baldwin said, the “prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages”.

The harlot’s prerogative ensured that when Liam Fox said negotiating a deal with the EU will be “the easiest thing in human history”, or when David Davis promised in 2016 that by now we would have “trade deals with the US and China”, or when Johnson and Gove swore there would be £350m a week for the NHS, they never expected to be held to account. True democratic politicians are responsible for their words. The Brexit right never is.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... _clipboard

Well worth a read whatever side of the aisle you sit in.

[Rum]

Well worth a read. I continue to be of the 'informed' opinion rather than of the 'religious belief' brigade (see article) that leaving the EU is a massive mistake for the ordinary people of this country who will I am certain be far poorer, not just economically, as a result.

"The religious insistence that supporting Brexit is a matter of faith, not reason, has the propaganda benefit of keeping supporters in line. Despite the collapse in the pound and living standards, despite the descent of the negotiations into the mire, not one prominent supporter of Brexit has admitted to the smallest doubt. The normal arguments of politics no more exist on the right than they do in the Church of Scientology. Who will break ranks when they know a movement run by vicious hacks will denounce them as traitors? Newspaper proprietors have power without responsibility, Stanley Baldwin said, the “prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages”."