Just today I voted about an energy act, a police act and a residence planning act. I admit that I didn't study the law texts carefully. Instead I read the neutral explanation of the government and both explanations of the pro and contra committees and decided whether the reasonings convinced me or not.

So even in Switzerland you could get the proverbial shit show if someone managed to convince the people with misleading arguments, and I am afraid this already happened a few times.

The referendum should have been held now: "We have this deal prepared, would you leave with this deal, leave with no deal, or remain?"

They want May to come up with a better plan for a "No deal" Brexit. To take a much harder stance against the EU in negotiations. THAT's why they voted against her.

I feel like this is going in a VERY different direction than is being implied in the comments here.

And let's be honest here: it might work. In the EU, in all countries where I can understand the language: France, Belgium, Ireland, the Netherlands there are artikels on the front page of the main newspaper about companies lobbying to force their governments to simply break ranks with the EU in case of "No deal": to have a trade pact with the UK ready to go March 29. In theory, that's not legal, but there is precedent. If the UK can get trade deals with the US (which is not going to be a problem), Ireland, Belgium, France and the Netherlands, the damage of a no deal Brexit will be limited quite a bit. A "fuck the lot of you. No deal !" approach ... it's not out of the question that they actually make it work.

Plus, you know, it's clearly what the majority of the voters want and in theory both the UK and these European countries are democracies. On would think that would make it simple.

And then there's the question of what happens if Juncker gets called on his bluff. AFD, 5*, Lega Nord and FN will certainly see their hand strengthened quite a bit if the UK blows up their EU membership and actually gets away with it. Talk about worst possible outcome for everyone.

The EU should say "ok ... voters decided, sucks, but let's make this work. Let's give the UK a fair exit and a fair trade deal". That is in the interest of everyone in the EU AND everyone in the UK ... with the notable exception of the EU politicians themselves.

Non-EU countries make trade deals with the EU who is collectively acting on their member states behalf.

There will _NEVER_ be a "side" trade deal between Britain and an EU member state directly.

Don't feel too bad about not knowing this. The original Minister for Brexit David Davis (& embarrassingly enough a former Europe minister) also didn't know this.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/minister-for-...

> However one of the main basic features of the European Union is that EU countries cannot negotiate individual trade deals without side countries and instead do so as a bloc of 28.

For example, Switzerland has trade deals that explicitly exclude certain EU member states (notably but not exclusively Romania). France has oil trade deals with African countries and China. And so on and so forth.

And of course there's the Swiss, Denmark and Norwegian middle-ground situations.

99% sure that is an impossibility but willing to take a look at any refs/articles you could link?

> Switzerland has trade deals that explicitly exclude certain EU member states

Similarly, pretty sure this is an impossibility. Any trade agreements are with and available to (all members of) the EU under the same set of conditions or they're not and they(Switzerland) would then trade under WTO rules.

Now you could say there's some excuse here. The oil in question technically never enters the EU, so it "doesn't have to" follow EU legislation (which prohibits dealing commercially with Iran). I'm sure if necessary something like that will be pointed out. Maybe it's also "not" Total selling the oil, but obviously they get part of the profit. And I'm sure there's some reason "Iran is not involved at all".

Also worth pointing out: the US has in the meantime successfully forced Total, over the LOUD protest of both French and German governments to abandon this deal.

2) https://www.expatica.com/ch/moving/visas/guide-for-eu-efta-c...

You can see the rules about employing Romanian and Bulgarian citizens (which are EU citizens) in Switzerland are very different from employing, say, French or German citizens. Note that this is one of the things the UK now tells Britain is non-negotiable. Somehow in practice another (labour related) trade deal the EU ... has negotiated it.

Of course, there are historical reasons for this, but of course that's true for all trade deals.

Any other EU company could have done the same.

re: 2) Seems like that provision was in the agreement Switzerland made with the EU:

from: https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/business/freedom-of-movement_sw...

> Switzerland first activated such a safeguard clause – a controversial instrument of its complex dealings with the EU – in 2012, to limit the number of citizens arriving from certain new member countries who joined the EU in 2004..

They are getting a fair exit and trade deal.

That's what is happening now. Britain seems to be slowly realising that them being part of the EU was more beneficial to them (& the EU) than any other way.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-46899466

PM May's interpretation merits repeating I think:

She will "continue to work to deliver on the solemn promise to the people of this country to deliver on the result of the referendum and leave the European Union"

Having watched the video, it might be relevant to add the response was applause. It seems to me that when push comes to shove, the conservatives seem to be operating under the conviction that another "Exit EU" referendum would have the same result. Whilst I have no way to know if that's right or not, I would argue that they do represent the majority of the people of Britain and therefore know better than I do.

As they are entitled to...Doesn't change anything really. Nobody wins with a hard Brexit but there's only so far the EU can go with concessions before it no longer makes sense. That point has been (roughly) hit.

Secondly, that deal being voted down doesn't mean everybody who voted it down thought there was a better deal out there. Labour and friends want to stay in the EU. They wouldn't attend May's planning unless a hard brexit was taken off the table(British version of saying/not US version).

It's quite telling that both Remainers & Leavers viewed the vote failing as a success.

So in effect consensus seems to be that the EU is risking a hard Brexit in the same way you do: threaten the British public with exactly what they voted they wanted, in hopes of achieving the opposite (no Brexit at all).

Furthermore: negotiations do not appear to be all that friendly. E.g. https://www.ft.com/content/9c59a204-fc6d-11e8-aebf-99e208d3e... as to how enthousiastic Irish citizens are about this particular problem, read this https://www.ft.com/content/ec894272-18db-11e9-9e64-d150b3105...

I think it's clear that I think this is dishonest, putting the interests of politicians ahead of those of the population, and to boot it's risky. The EU population does not want this at all, quite the reverse. They want trade with the UK to be as unaffected as possible, which of course means a trade deal that's as favorable to the UK as possible. Second the EU population certainly does not want to eat the economic hits that a hard Brexit would bring and expects their politicians to prevent this scenario.

I fear that if an election is called in the UK, which is the almost inevitable outcome of delaying or stopping Brexit, the end result will be a disorderly "fuck you" Brexit when conservatives gain another 10% of the vote with a promised firm hard Brexit negotiating stance. At that point Ireland, and perhaps France will suddenly find that the Euro is a serious impediment to their ability to react to limit the damage, and London will be able to adapt. This will further amplify the already anti-EU parties in France, Italy and Germany, and at this point it won't take much to force centrist parties in both countries to become anti-EU and propagate further.

An additional worry is that we're 10 years into the best economic situation we've seen in Europe in >50 years. This is the situation we're in, with essentially the best possible economic background. That at some point the economy will turn is inevitable, and it will further amplify anti-EU stances like it always does. If politicians find a way to combine both forces to hit at the same time, I don't even want to try to predict what could happen.

And trying to use such evidence in court could be repealed then as obtained illegally. (Surveillance without a warrant.) The spirit of the law is to allow reasonably incidental recording only. A zoom camera pointed at your window is not covered, neither are directional microphones etc.

Law is not an algorithm. It is executed by judges and jurors.

(Note: not a lawyer, this is not legal advice, etc.)

1) UKIP (or a coalition of Brexit-minded parties) wins general election.

2) PM Nigel Farage opens withdrawal negotiations with the EU.

3) 2+ years later, with a complete withdrawal agreement on the table, a referendum is held on whether to accept the deal.

4) If at least 50% of voters support the withdrawal agreement, it comes into effect within two months.

This is not a pipe dream — it's exactly how the countries who joined EU in 1995 did it.

David Cameron is entirely to blame for this ongoing sad charade that makes a mockery of UK's democratic processes.

Yes it is. Asked "do you want to fundamentally change status quo in some random yet to be decided way that most experts warn you will result in chaos" population should have voted "no".

Population would have voted "no" if just a few more young people cared enough to get their asses to the voting booths.

The lessons from Brexit are the same as the lessons from Trump in USA, Kaczyński in Poland, Orban in Hungary: 1. vote 2. don't vote populists. 3. don't disregard warnings of experts. 4. don't buy conspiracy theories. 5. don't engage in witch hunts against minorities and don't vote people who do so.

It's not a lot to expect of people. It's the bare minimum if democracy is to work at all.

Cameron is at fault too, of course. Shouldn't have played with the fire. But some politicians will play with fire if there's a profit to be made and power to get. It's the voters who have to stop them, not the other way.

The details were left to be sorted out later and that's where all the trouble is.

If the details of Brexit were included in the referendum, there wouldn't be any trouble in implementing it.

But, you can bet that the ~half of voters that wanted Brexit aren't even in agreement on how to implement it, let alone trying to gain the support of all those that never wanted it to begin with.

In the end the referendum was more of an opinion poll than legislation that voters could analyze and make an informed decision.

I don't think you can fault the voters for answering the questions put to them. It's not like the ballot comes with a comment box: "I want independence from the EU, but I'm also concerned that you didn't think through how to implement it." They just vote Yes and expect politicians to do their job.

I really don't rate the Guardian for all of its content, this particular article explains well and is reasonably sourced

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jul/09/young-peopl...

Wouldn't exit polls record the ages of voters though? Seems strange that there's so little data on this.

I don't understand the need to youth-bash here. Turnout for young people was pretty similar to that of older demographics. There was a generational gap in how people voted, but not so much in whether they voted or not. [1]

https://www.opinium.co.uk/did-young-people-bother-to-vote-in...

In fact, turnout was 64% among 18-24 year olds and 65% among 25-39 year old, which is closer to the population average than could have been expected.

Britain is the second largest net contributor to the EU next to Germany. Britain will be absolutely fine.

However, the UK will lose the huge amount of influence it has at the moment on the world stage, will be pressured by bigger economies to accept unfavorable trade deals and deregulation (US food standards, VISAs, etc) and its manufacturing will be severely damaged; it could possibly collapse entirely. The irony is that this will likely create a wave of unemployment in the very regions that voted in favour of Brexit.

But regardless of the consequences, if you think people voted for a "no deal" when they voted Brexit, you are deluded. Let's illustrate my point with a few quotes:

"The free trade agreement that we will ahve to do with the European Union should be one of the easiest in human history" - Liam Fox - 2017

"Getting out of the EU can be quick and easy - the UK holds most of the cards in any negotiation" - John Redwood - 2016

"Within minutes of a vote for Brexit, CEO's would be knocking down Chancellor Merkel's door demanding access to the British market" - David Davis 2016

“It is also true that the single market is of considerable value to many UK companies and consumers, and that leaving would cause at least some business uncertainty, while embroiling the Government for several years in a fiddly process of negotiating new arrangements, so diverting energy from the real problems of this country – low skills, low social mobility, low investment etc – that have nothing to do with Europe.” - Boris Johnson 2016

As you can see, no deal is far from the position that was pushed to the people, even after the vote had occurred. Saying people voted for a "no deal" because they voted for Brexit is disingenuous. Long gone is the time of "Having our cake and eat it"

Behind the scenes however, the British seem to stay important. The safekeeping of the Gladio operatives' names, Steele's involvement against Trump, the UK national who started the White Helmets, ... I have the vague feeling that les rosbifs seem to pop up a lot where the action is, just not too obviously.

Not what I said. I said they voted to leave regardless of deal. So if EU doesn't want to make a deal then so be it. The no-deal hysteria seems entirely contrived by the remainers as far as I can tell.

A favourable deal from the EU was never going to happen prior to leaving. The negotiations BEGIN once Britain leaves and they explore their options - which appear to be considerable quite frankly. The EU is in trouble, not Britain.

While some people were undoubtedly ok with a downside (especially if that cost was bourne by others, e.g. pensioners with guaranteed incomes and no jobs to lose), many leave voters accepted assurances "this would be the easiest negotiation ever". Remainers pointing out there was a downside were roundly condemned for "talking down Britain".

I would be curious to know about why the EU is in trouble; in my opinion the UK is, and massively. Brexiters have sold leaving the EU as the solution to a wide range of issues (housing, health, immigration, etc) and when people will realise all of this was extraordinarily optimistic (not to say, a lie), there will be a certain uprising and it won’t be pretty. We could also mention that the union is also at risk, from the non respect of the Belfast agreement to the fact that Scotland and Northern Ireland did not vote for Brexit: independence desires could loom again, and it could become very real very soon.

Every sensible organisation in this country have warned against a no deal and the catastrophic effect it would have. -8% GDP according to the government’s analysis. But yeah bloody remainers, the source of all misery...

Have you read the EU's no deal plan? Ireland's no deal plan?

Their plan is this: - Allow the UK to keep trading with the EU on WTO terms - Do not halt trade with the UK. No need to, damages both. - No border in Northern Ireland. They won't build it, we won't build it, empty threat. - Boats, Lorries, Ferries to continue as normal until agreements made. Guess what, this is what real independent nations do with eachother.

Ireland's agriculture industry sells 80% of its produce to the UK. It's in big trouble with no trade.

Germany sells lots of cars to the UK. It's in big trouble with no trade.

4 Million EU citizens live here, they are in big trouble with no reciprocal agreement.

French, German and Spanish fishermen rely on British waters to for fishing as they are rather lucrative - to great detriment of the British fishing industry. They are in trouble when we take them back.

Spain, France, Italy and Germany are all having economic issues the UK isn't particularly having right now. Look at jobs, youth unemployment etc.

18% of the EU's goods are exported to the UK. The whole EU is in trouble with no trade. The reverse figure is fake news thanks to the rotterdam effect.

That 8% GDP figure is ridiculous and proven to be wrong [https://capx.co/the-bank-of-englands-brexit-forecasts-arent-...]. The assumptions it makes are the worst possible and completely unrealistic. Those figures suggest that the effect on the UK economy would be worse than WW2 - a time where Europe was occupied by a hostile power and Britain was at war with trade convoys regularly being sunk.

Personally I'd be happy for Scotland to leave the Union. They are a net receiver of English taxes. Also, would never be granted EU membership thanks to our hypocritical friends in Spain and their own issue with certain parts of their country declaring independence.

The EU suits large corporations. It keeps wages for the least skilled in our society as low as possible, more workers means less pay.

All we are asking for is to be an independent nation state, just like more than 150 other countries.

I have never said countries from the EU would not be impacted economically by a 'no deal' scenario. It would be bad for the whole continent. I was commenting on the "the UK will be perfectly fine, the EU is the one in trouble". Nonetheless, the economy of the UK is hugely dependant on the EU (financial services, JIT manufacturing, etc.) and the UK will greatly suffer from a no-deal. Quoting a highly biased and very specific article from a man who has been pushing for Brexit from the very start will not change the facts; a man, by the way, who said that leaving the EU with no-deal was more important than respecting the Belfast agreement. By the way, he also said that the UK would be even around 2030 (and he is a rather optimistic individual when it comes to Brexit): https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DqTgF9QXQAADxR5.jpg (https://www.theguardian.com/politics/shortcuts/2018/jul/24/t...)

I also hope that I am wrong, but I can definitely feel a xenophobic underlying tone in your message. That's regrettable.

I have zero doubts that there is going to be a hard border within a year after a hard brexit. There is already a massive duty fraud problem with the UK https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-warns-uk-again-to-recoup-... which would only escalate.

I have the impression that most EU goverments are just fed up with this british farce and want it to be over and the UK gone.

On the other end of the spectrum, leaving the EU, but remaining under all EU regulations, staying in the free trade / free movement / etc laws, being in a similar position as now, paying massive divorce bills and paying essentially membership fees / EU taxes with no return EU investment into the UK and with no voice or representation in the EU politics at all, the whole 'vassal state' thing, could be technically "leaving the EU" as well. But that's also not what anyone voting to leave meant either.

"Out at any price / In at any price" is as absurd a polarisation as the above examples.

People have been trying to paint this as a binary issue - ever since the referrendum put it in such a YES/NO terminology. But we're not binary creatures, life is messy and complex.

But EU agreed to the decision? UK didn't.

> Britain will be absolutely fine.

We will see I guess :)

Or just people don't like bashing them for voting populists :)

Poe's law again. What's up with these posts?

Voting, at its core, is a popularity contest. How exactly do you NOT vote for populists?

> Daniele Albertazzi and Duncan McDonnell define populism as an ideology that "pits a virtuous and homogeneous people against a set of elites and dangerous 'others' who are together depicted as depriving (or attempting to deprive) the sovereign people of their rights, values, prosperity, identity, and voice".

I don't have problems recognizing politicians propagating such views. Do you?